Carmelitas

A long time ago in a state far far away from here Janssen made these delicious little caramel things. And then I ate the whole pan of them. And then I licked said pan clean. And then I made the caramel things time and time again until I blew up like a balloon. Then I moved to Utah and made them for my family, anxious for them to try such a delicacy. And that is when my mom said, "oh, you made caramelitas!" I was a little dumbfounded, caramelitas were a dessert my sister would always make but I never had because I thought they were just a lesser version of chocolate chip cookies. It turns out that indeed, these "chocolate caramel bars" are the exact same recipe as caramelitas and it's a good thing I didn't think I liked them as a kid or else I would probably be twice the woman I am today, literally.

Anyway, these are easy to make and major crowd pleasers! Because they are so rich they seem to go a lot further than regular cookies, regular people can have a small little cube and feel satisfied (I, however, still have a pan size portion). Enjoy

Caramelitas

By: Janssen and Jennifer

48 caramels
½ cup evaporated milk
2 cups chocolate chips
1 ½ cup flour
1/3 t. salt
1 1/8 cup brown sugar
1 ½ cup quick oats
2/3 t. soda
1 cup butter softened

• Melt caramels and milk in a glass dish in microwave.
• Stir every few minutes until smooth.
• Mix the dry ingredients and butter until crumbly.
• Press 2/3 crumb mixture into a greased 9X13 pan, and set aside the rest of crust.
• Bake crust at 350 for 5 min.
• Take out of oven and sprinkle with chocolate chips while crust is hot. Pour caramel over top. Sprinkle remaining crumb mixture on top. Bake again for 15 minutes, top with barely start to brown.
• Bring some to Kristi.
  

Kettle Corn

I was tempted to just microwave a bag of popcorn and take a picture for the blog, but that felt a little deceitful. Truth be told, I made this delicious kettle corn and then went to take a picture and then my battery was dead. While I did beg my parents and husband to hold off on eating the popcorn for two minutes so I could photograph the popcorn that request proved impossible and the entire batch was gobbled up before I could do it. What makes matters worse is I used my very last 1/3 cup of popcorn kernels to make one meager batch of the popcorn and now I crave it almost hourly and have no way to make more until I go back to the store. Life is so hard sometimes ; )

Do yourself a favor and make this today! PS. the website I borrowed this image from is chaosinthekitchen.com, I'd never visited before but man, all of their recipes look absolutely delish!

Stove-Top Kettle Corn
by: Our Best Bites

3 tablespoons canola or vegetable oil
1/3 cup popcorn kernels
3 tablespoons granulated sugar
kosher salt

Place a large stock pot (or your whirly pop) on the stove top. Set heat to medium-high. Add oil. While oil is heating measure your popcorn into a small bowl. Add sugar to the kernels. Wait until you see your oil smoke. It's very faint, so get down parallel to your pot and look for little billows of smoke coming. Then pour your kernel/sugar mixture into the pot. Immediately stir using a wooden spoon or rubber spatula, scraping sugar from the bottom of the pan. Only do this for about ten seconds (no one wants a popcorn kernel to peg you in the eyeball), then place the lid over the pan. Now if you are using a whirly pop, just give it a good spin every twenty seconds or so, if not then drape a dishtowel over your pot so you can hold the handles without burning your hands off. Hold the pot by the handles in a way that you're securing the lid on as well and shake pan side to side and in all directions and up and down a few times. Do this every twenty seconds (or for pete's sake just buy a whirly pop).

When you can tell that everything is popped remove the lid and stir immediately. Sprinkle with kosher salt to taste, then eat warm right out of the pan, or if it lasts long enough I suppose you could put it in a bowl. Take it a little easy on the salt though, I very nearly ruined my batch by getting a little shaker happy with my salt. Enjoy!

Tres Leches

Okay guess what? MY NEW LENS CAME! But all of the pictures for the recipes I am going to post were taken last night...at like midnight, with the old lens. It was pretty funny because I put the new lens on, drug my six-year-old outside and took pictures of her and they were like...beyond awful...all flooded with light. I figured I would just need to read the manual for the new lens but then I realized...the lens was NOT even attached to the camera. Doi. Once I attached the lens the right way life got much much better. I can't wait to show you.

In the mean time though, this is probably the best cake I have ever made or eaten (oh and I have eaten my fair share of cakes people). At my last visit to Cafe Rio I got a thing on my receipt for a free dessert, I ordered the Tres Leches and loooooooved it. Unfortunately though when you have to share a small dessert with five people (darn kids...) you don't get very much of it. So I came away realizing that I had to learn how to make Tres Leches. Good news! It's easy as pie. Probably easier, and the results are stellar. I will be taking this to my next family function. Good thing I am growing fond of my love handles.

Tres Leches

by: allrecipes.com

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 cup unsalted butter
1 cup white sugar
5 eggs
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

For topping:
2 cups whole milk ( I only had 2%, the shame!)
1 (14oz) can sweetened condensed milk (do yourself a favor and do not calculate how many calories are in this can alone. Trust me)
1 (12 fluid oz) can evaporated milk
1 1/2 cups heavy whipping cream
1/2 - 1 cup powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350 dgs F. Grease and flour one 9x13 inch baking pan. Sift flour and baking powder together and set aside. In a separate bowl cream butter and the one cup sugar together until fluffy. Add eggs (one at a time, with about ten seconds between each) and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract; beat well. Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture 2 tablespoons at a time; mix until well blended. Pour batter into prepared pan. Bake at 350 dgs for 30 minutes. When cake is done pierce several times with a fork. Seriously...I made funky designs all over the cake, go to town. Set cake aside to cool.

Combine the whole milk (uno), condensed milk (dos), and evaporated milk (tres, tres leches!) together. Pour over the top of the cooled cake. Watch it all soak in. Mmmmm.

Whip whipping cream, when the cream is almost whipped add in some powdered sugar (to taste, but if that stresses you out, add like half a cup) and a dash (teaspoon) vanilla. Spread whipped cream over the cake. Be sure to refrigerate the cake!

Here's the thing. This cake was good, but it was SO MUCH better after the cake had been in the fridge a while. So I recommend letting the cake sit in the fridge for an hour or two before serving. Seriously, I had it for breakfast this morning....mmmm baby. My love handles are quivering just thinking about it.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

I am a professional garage-saler. Every Saturday morning at about 6AM I start twitching with excitement. Sadly the garage sales in Utah aren't quite as awesome as the ones in Texas, but I am learning to adjust. Last Saturday though....was a total bust. Not only did I drive way out of the way to go to a neighborhood garage sale, but the sales themselves were pretty pathetic and overpriced. Aside from a life-size cardboard cutout of Edward Cullen, there wasn't a treasure to be found. (And they wanted too much for said life size cutout of Edward, and just to clear things up it wasn't that I wanted the cutout for me. It was to prop outside of the front door of a dear friend who loves Edward more than Jacob - weirdo). Anyway, at one of the garage sales there were some kids out selling cookies. I have a personal standard to always buy food from kids. Always. So I snagged a cookie and cinnamon roll.

I was already to the next neighborhood when I took my first bite of the cookie and...oh my. It was the best chocolate chip cookie I had ever tasted, which was really saying something since I make a mean chocolate chip cookie. So, I stewed about it for a good five minutes and decided to drive back to the kids selling cookies. As embarrassing as it was I found the maker of the cookies and got her e-mail address. Here we are nearly a week later and she sent me the recipe and I have made and devoured an entire batch.

The really ironic thing is that her recipe for chocolate chip cookies is strikingly similar to my own, with just a few minor changes. As for which one is the better cookie...well, it just depends on which one is in front of me at the time.

Garage Sale Chocolate Chip Cookies

by: Jenni Carlson, a very nice person who was nice to not call me crazy when I demanded her recipe.

1 cup shortening
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 eggs
2 1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 bag of milk chocolate chips

Cream together the shortening, brown sugar, white sugar and vanilla. Add the two eggs, then mix in the flour, salt and soda. When thoroughly mixed, gently mix in the chocolate chips. Form in to balls. Please on greased cookie sheet and bake at 375 for 8-10 minutes.

Mom's Chocolate Chip Cookies

by: Jan Genessy

1/2 cup white sugar
1 cup shortening
1 cup brown sugar, well packed
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 eggs
2 1/4 cups flour
1teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Cream together shortening, sugar, vanilla and eggs. Add salt and soda, mixing well. Add 1 1/4 cups of the flour, mix well. Add the last cup of flour and mix by hand, add the chocolate chips and mix by hand. Bake at 350dgs for 7-10 minutes. The trick to these cookies is to not over bake them. Pull out when they first start to crack on top or start to barely turn golden brown.

Notes: I had the worlds biggest milk chocolate chips when I made the garage sale cookies. For reals, they were like Hershey's kisses. So I am not sure if that is what happened or if the recipe just calls too many,but I would say that you would be good to just add a cup of chocolate chips there in that first recipe. Enjoy!

Chocolate Drizzled Strawberries and Cream Pie

I was really happy to see this recipe pop up a few weeks ago. I love strawberries, and I love pies, but I have a thing about fruit pies. I haven't quite figured out if it is that I don't like warm fruit, I don't like cooked fruit, or if I just don't like mushy pureed fruit. Probably a combination of all of the above. So this pie was perfect for me, plus it turned out beautifully (which you would know if I could take a decent picture, I'm working on it - promise). With strawberries as beautiful and cheap as they are right now, and such an easy delicious recipe, you should give it a try! I also made a delicious strawberry soup the other day, it was divine, but I forgot to take a picture, whoops!

Chocolate-Drizzled Strawberries and Cream Pie
Recipe by Our Best Bites

1 quart fresh strawberries (frozen’s not gonna cut it here)
1 8-oz. package cream cheese at room temperature (light is fine)
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 cup packed light brown sugar
1 cup heavy whipping cream
1/4 cup powdered sugar
1 9″ graham cracker crust (store-bought or homemade, I have the easiest and best graham cracker crust recipe that I will post soon, I will be so disappointed if you ever buy a crust again)
1-2 ounces chocolate

In a medium bowl, beat the softened cream cheese, brown sugar, and vanilla until light and fluffy. In a separate large bowl, beat the whipping cream and powdered sugar until medium peaks form. Add about 1 c. of the whipping cream mixture to the cream cheese mixture. Beat until smooth and well-combined. Add the remaining whipping cream mixture and mix until just combined. Spread in the graham cracker crust and refrigerate for a few minutes while you prepare the strawberries.

Wash the strawberries and cut off the stems. Blot dry with a paper towel and then gently press, cut side down, into the whipped cream mixture. Set aside.

If using a chocolate bar, break it into equal pieces and place in a small Ziploc bag. Microwave for 1-1 1/2 minutes, stopping the microwave every 20 seconds to mash the bag. You want the chocolate to be melted but not hot at all. When the chocolate is melted, snip a corner off the bag and drizzle it over the strawberries. Refrigerate for at least three hours before serving. Serves 8.

Liege Waffles

For the inaugural recipe of LemonGlaze, I'm choosing the best waffle I've ever made or eaten. A few months ago during a time of extreme duress, my husband and I took a much needed weekend getaway to downtown Salt Lake City. Having lived near Salt Lake City for nearly my entire life (minor detours taken to Portland OR, Rochester MN, and Austin TX), I figured there wasn't much to see or do here that I haven't already seen and done dozens of times. I was dead wrong.

On the first morning of our trip we visited Bruges Waffles, and my life has never been the same. I dream of the sweet, crisp, savory morsels nearly every night. We enjoyed our waffle so much that we went back to Bruges for dinner, passing up PF Changs, Olive Garden, and about a dozen other of our favorite restaurants.

I finally gathered my courage, borrowed a Belgian Waffle maker, scouted out pearl sugar (hint: IKEA), and attempted what I thought was the impossible - recreating the Liege Waffle from Bruges. My friends, I was successful!

Liege Waffles

From: www.food.com

1 package yeast (2 1/4 teaspoons)
1/3 cup lukewarm water
1 1/2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1/8 teaspoon salt
2 cups flour
3 eggs
1 cup (two sticks) butter, softened
1 cup pearl sugar

Mix yeast, water, sugar and salt, and let develop for 15 minutes. Place flour into a large bowl. Make a well, pour in yeast mixture, begin to knead. You might start to panic at this point, and at several points during the kneading process. I am here to tell you, it's going to turn out fine. It really will, I wanted to give up but I am so very glad I pressed onward. Continue to knead while adding eggs, one at a time. Continue kneading while adding the butter, 2 tablespoons each addition, mixing well.

Let dough rest until doubled in size (approximately 1 hour). Gently mix in pearl sugar. Let rest for 15 minutes. Separate dough into balls of 3 tablespoons dough mixture. When your Belgian Waffle Iron is hot and ready, place dough ball in iron. Cook 3-5 minutes until waffles are lightly brown on top (this only took three minutes in my waffle iron). Serve warm with Creme Fraiche and Belgian Chocolate. Or, if you are like me and you didn't realize that Creme Fraiche has to sit for nearly an entire day, serve with fresh whipped cream and melted chocolate chips. Still nearly as divine.

Also, I'm doing you a favor and NOT posting the calorie count on these waffles. I promise they are worth it, and very much so.