Fiesta Verde

Merry Christmas!  Sorry this post is so late (and it will probably be a short one)!  Last week I made a Mexican fiesta! I made enchiladas Verde, Black beans, and Mexican rice.  The enchiladas and black beans were amazing!  The rice...was not so great. :/

All was from scratch!  I even roasted the poblano peppers and tomatillos! Yum!  Everything (except the rice which was kinda crunchy...) turned out great and I had leftovers for a week!

We took a couple weeks off because of travel and vacation.  New posts in a week or so!

Peppermint crunch cookies

This week I made dessert.  With it being the week before Christmas, I had to look for some holiday recipe to try.  I came across these dipped oatmeal peppermint cookies on Pinterest and thought they looked perfect.  Peppermint is one of my favorite flavors of this season, so I thought it was worth a try.  These ended up being SO much better than I thought they would be.  Mom and Megan loved them, and then I brought some to VA to my aunt and uncle's house today for them to try, and they were a hit there too!  These cookies are a nice balance of sweet and salty, crunchy and soft.  And they were super easy to make!  I used Andes mint baking chips and Nestle Tollhouse white chocolate chips for dipping.  New favorite holiday treat here!

http://www.yourhomebasedmom.com/oatmeal-peppermint-dipped-cookies/

A different take on lasagna...

So last week I was in charge of dinner.  I saw this recipe for Roasted Pumpkin and Smoked Blue Cheese Lasagna, two of my favorite flavors!  Thought it sounded delicious.  The only problem was, you have slice real pumpkin from the shell and roast it.  I took an easier route and substituted already cubed butternut squash, similar consistency and flavor I think?  Anywho, the lasagna turned out beautifully, but it didn't taste nearly as good as I thought it would.  Honestly, I didn't really like it at all, and I think Megan would agree.  The blue cheese was a little too strong, and we both thought it needed something acidic, like tomato, to mix up the flavor combinations.  I think if I were to make this again, I would ease up on the blue cheese and not make it such a prominate ingredient.  Here are the pics!  (Ooo and this was my first time making a real lasagna with lasagna noodles...kind of pleased with how it turned out :) )

http://naturallyella.com/2012/10/29/roasted-pumpkin-and-smoked-blue-cheese-lasagna/

Pheonix cake?

This week I was in charge of dessert again and I made a cake! :)  I found this cake and recipe in Southern Living Magazine!

So pretty!  I knew it was a lofty goal but I thought it was possible.  Boy was I wrong!!  This was the hardest cake I've ever tried to make.  And on top of it I decided to do a lemon curd filling inside (recipe also inside).

1st challenge: a homemade cake.  NO BOX!  I used cake flour and everything!  The hardest part was beating the egg whites until they were fluffy!  I did not realize that it would take so long for the peaks to get stiff.  I used a hand mixer instead of the kitchen aid...BIG mistake.  My arm was so tired. It took forever!!  So I am pretty sure I did not let the peaks get stiff enough so the batter was a little denser than I think it was supposed to be.  The cake ended up being only 2 layers instead of 3.

2nd challenge: the assembly.  I went to put the cake together and I think I overfilled it...The lemon filling came pouring out the sides!  So instead of the beautiful white cake it looked like this... :(

I'm not gonna lie...I cried.  At this point I had spent about 6 hours on this cake! And my kitchen was covered in dirty pots and bowls.  So depressing!  So I left it alone for a while.  Later, when I came back  I remembered that I had some fondant left over from another cake I had made.  And some edible pearls.  And like a pheonix rising from the ashes my cake was restored!

Its not the beautiful white cake from the magazine but I wasnt too disappointed with how it turned out!  And it tasted pretty delicious too.