I am at war

With my oven.

evil oven


Oh yes, the dear sweet beautiful oven I was so excited to get. I can't seem to get anything I bake in it to turn out right. (only one time was error on my end)

Things don't cook right - they either burn like the blondies

or today I tried to make chocolate peanutbutter chip cookies and they came out undercooked - even after cookng for well over the time on the recipe

ewwy gooey cookies


( I like gooey cookies but I tired this and I feel like if I ate a whole cookie I'd have a tummy ache and probably salmonella. )

- and then of course the next batch i burned.

they may not look burned but they are hard as a rock. SIGH


This is really upsetting to me- I haven't successfully baked something since I moved here. :( I called my mema today to whine about this and ask her advice since she has used a gas oven forever. She suggested Iget an oven thermometer to make sure the oven temp is accurate. So I am going to do this when I make it to walmart. Hopefully I can get back in the baking game. I am of course the wanna be baker...and I wanna be baking. SIGH.

I am open to any and all suggestions out there. I promise I will bake soon. In fact I am doing a little baking this weekend for my dad's bday - but I am waiting til I get to Frederick to use Moms oven. I know I can bake in that. :-D

French Dip Sandwiches with Au Jus

[Printable Recipe]


Matt loves french dip sandwiches, and always requests we make them - or go to a place that has good ones. One night he was thinking out loud about how he wanted one, and I said find a recipe, go to the store and get the stuff and I will make it. So he did.(Recipe from Allrecipes.com) I have never actually had them - maybe a bite of Matt's. These were very easy and very good. Makes for a really easy dinner. Typically when you make this you roast the beef in a slow cooker for a day so that it is very tender. I don't have a slow cooker- and we didn't decided on this until 7pm so a day of roasting wasn't possible anyway.

Ingredients:

1 (10.5 oz) Can beef consomme

1 Cup water

1 pound thin sliced deli roast beef

8 slices provolone cheese

4 hoagie rolls.

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 - open hoagie rolls and lay out on baking sheet (we used the small toaster oven - and buttered the bread a little before toasting.)


bread with butter for toasting


heat beef consomme and water in a medium saucepan over medium- high heat to make a rich beef brother. ( We added garlic salt - though garlic powder will be used next time the consomme was salty enough, onion powder and pepper to season) Place the roast beef in the broth and warm for 3 mins.

warming the consomme and spices


Matt adding the beef


beef warmed and ready to go


Arrange meat on the hoagie rolls and top with 2 slices of cheese ( we added the cheese to the rolls half way though toasting so the cheese would melt to the bread)



melted and toasty





Bake the sandwiches in oven for 5 mins or until the cheese just begins to melt ( we skipped this as we had already melted the cheese)

Serve sandwiches with small bowls of the leftover broth for dipping.

meet piled on and sauce for dipping. (this was Matt's with extra meat)


This was very good and will be a repeat on the monthly menu.

Blondies

[Printable Recipes]


Matt and I were flipping through the tv one night- and there was this dude on there baking cakes and other pretty yummy looking cakes and desserts. It was on pbs and that was about all I knew, but I knew I needed the recipe for these things he was making. Matt went to the internet and figured it out. It was called Everyday Baking, Matt found a recipe for Blondies and requested I make them. So last Friday before I went to meet my mom, I threw them together. Making them was easy, but I wish I knew how my oven would handle because the sides were a little dark and hard. My oven is gas now - I am used to electric. I guess I should have watched them a little better. The recipe said 40-45 mins so I put them in for 40 and figured I'd be ok...I think they would have been perfect at 35.

Ingredients

1 stick butter melted

1 cup packed brown sugar

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 tsp salt

1 cup semisweet chocolate chips

1 cup chopped walnuts (I left these out)

Directions

Preheat oven to 350

line an 8 inch square baking pan with parchment paper leaving an over hang on 2 sides. Spray paper and pan with Pam (or butter it)



In a large bowl- whisk butter and sugar until smooth, then whisk in egg and vanilla.

butter , sugar, egg and vanilla


Add flour and salt and mix until moistened.

flour added


Fold in chocolate chips saving a little for the top (Walnuts too if using them)




Put in pan and sprinkle with a little more chocolate chips.



sprinkled with choc chips and ready to cook


Bake until golden brown 40-45 mins (or 35 depending - just watch them)




Set pan on wire rack to cool. When cook remove with parchment paper and cut into 16 squares.




These were good - I wish we could have had more than 4 or 5. I will be making them again. Maybe I can find the recipe for the topping they use on the blondies at Applebees and I can have my old roommate Carol, and her NJ friends over. That's what blondies remind me of. Applebees with Carol and Zanzibar Scuf. (Sigh I miss college) They were very easy to make. Plus I love my kitchen so I want to spend more time it in. :-D

Sorry I am MIA

This move is making me crazy. We are in the new apartment....and we are mostly unpacked. But there is stuff everywhere. I am making a big effort this weekend to make it look like a home. My goal is to hang pictures by Sunday.

I did bake once... it was a learning experience about my oven - it get HOT compared to the electric ( I now have gas.)  I will post the recipe soon I promise - Maybe even a round 2 for it this weekend/week depending.

Bear with me, and don't give up on me. I will be back soon. I have so many things I want to try, and I keep finding new blogs that have wonderful things on them. More added to my "must try" list.

Also, Aug 30 is Dear OLD Dad's 50th birthday. I have some ideas floating about for his cake and desserts for the cookout he wants to have with just a couple friends... I think we are actually listening to him. The man turns 50 and we are only having a small cookout (where I am sure he will be doing the cooking out...) O well - it is what he wants. ( I did find black candles today- and a cool 50 is nifty candle) Small cookout or not the cake has to hold 50 candles so it won't be too small.

See you soon! PROMISE!

Aubrey's UF Cookie Cake

My bestest's 21st birthday was last Thursday. She lives in Florida, because I started a new job I couldn't go down for her birthday as I had planned. So I did the next best thing. I made her a birthday cake...her favorite to be exact. A cookie cake. Everyone loves a cookie cake, and it is the easiest type of cake to mail I think. (more on that later)

I started with a home made cookie cake. Then I decorated it.

Since Aub moved to FL to go to the University of Florida she has become obsessed with The Gators ( I don't blame her, I am obsessed with all things Testudo.)

So the only thing to do was to make her a gator cake. I thought I would be able to trace it with piping gel and transfer it to the cake like the soccer cake.

Well that didn't work, maybe 20% of the pattern transferred, and of course it was the outside, easy part, not the inside complicated part. So lucky for me I am a little artistic, so I hand drew the gator with icing, then filled it in.

the idea that failed


my attempt at fixing it


turned out great!!!!

finished product


After it was decorated I let the icing harden in the fridge over night. then wrapped it in plastic wrap and foil and froze it. put it in a bathroom scale box ( it was the perfect size for the cake, didn't give it much room to wiggle around.) Then I took it to the post office Saturday am and the lady put it in another box and stuffed it, marked it with fragile and perishable all over and off it went to Florida, I just had to hope that it went there quickly, and that it didn't get too hot and melted. She called me Monday and she got it! In one piece, the only thing messed up was the 21...not bad. If I can get a picture from her I will post how it looked when she got it. I am very very pleased with this cake. I am thinking that pretty cookie cakes my be my new favorite cake to make. :-D Want one?

Here is what she got... it survived pretty well! :-D