Author: Chocolate Castles

Welcome to Chocolate Castles, a blog about food, family and stories that hopefully will bring a smile to your heart. Thanks for reading chocolate castles and may the recipes and stories help bring your family and friends a little closer around the table! Remember that Princess On The Porch is still available on Amazon! Makes a great gift for anyone who enjoys being in the kitchen and needs a little laughter in their lives.
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Ezekiel Brand English Muffin BLAT’s

Chocolate Castles2 Comments

For some reason, I am on a sandwich kick. Maybe because it is warming up here finally and salads and sandwiches just sound good. Just returning from Whole Foods ( I can’t believe I even have recyclable bags now), I went with the intent to buy lots of fresh veggies. We are trying to cut down on gluten and meat during the week, so we can go crazy on the weekends. I came home with several new items today, such as gluten free tortilla wraps which I am going to make bean and cheese nachos, and Ezekiel brand, cinnamon and raisin English muffins. So I have lots of new items to test out this week. DId I mention that I even bought fresh collard greens? For those of you who know me, usually my grocery basket is full of cocoa, butter, cream cheese and Dr Peppers. Tonight, we are having grilled tilapia with grilled veggies. Randy will be shocked. Whole foods even have soy ice cream, all different flavors of which I have come to really like. Trader Jo’s have soy cherry-chocolate chip soy ice cream, which I could sit and eat the whole half gallon in one sitting. 

Because Randy is suppose to be watching how much gluten he is having, I have decided to help him out. Tomorrow, I will be packing him a Ezekiel muffin BLAT. (bacon, lettuce, avocado, tomato)

Just fry up 6 pieces of bacon until crisp. (3 pieces on each sandwich) This will all make 2 sandwiches Drain on paper towel. Slice a fresh tomato and an avocado. Wash 2 pieces of butter lettuce and wipe dry. Spread a little basil Pesto on each side of the muffin. Stack the bacon, lettuce and tomato and avocado and place muffin top over the BLAT.

At the end of the week, I will let you know if cutting back on the gluten and meat help us loose a couple of pounds. Since we don’t want to loose to much weight, we will end our evening eatting all the soy ice cream. /p>

BLAT’s might be the next big diet food. (I wish) Wonder if I will loose weight if I eat 3 of them?

Future Ad:

Want to loose some fat? Just eat a BLAT! sorry, it’s corny but I love that new word!

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Flourless Peanut Butter Cookies

Chocolate Castles1 Comment

It’s Saturday, everyone is out running errands and busy with honey-do’s but I wanted to pass this quick little recipe on to you so all those “honey’s” would have something good to much on during their breaks. With so many people eating gluten free this recipe intrigued me. Taken from Southern Lady magazine, so you know this is good, comes this recipe for yummy peanut butter cookies.

1 cup light brown sugar

1 cup crunchy peanut butter

1 large egg

1 teas baking soda

1 teas vanilla

Preheat oven to 350. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.

Mix the brown sugar and peanut butter together in a mixing bowl. Stir in the egg, baking soda and vanilla. Stir in chips.

Drop by tablespoonfuls onto the parchment paper and bake 10 minutes or until puffed. Cool the cookies on the baking sheet. Store in a covered container.

Makes 30 cookies

Chicken · Daily Thoughts · Meats · Starches

Security Guards & Smouthered Chicken

Chocolate Castles2 Comments

While living in CA we went onto watch the Ranger vs Angels play. We were excited to be going out to an evening of eating junk food without guilt. Why is it, when you are enjoying sports events or carnivals, car shows or festivals, we eat as though none of the calories will turn to fat? We pigged out on two tubs of popcorn, peanuts and foot long hot dogs. But we did have the sense to wash it all down with a diet Pepsi, after all, we do have to watch our cholesterol. We didn’t concern ourselves one iota with the fact that we had consumed more calories in one night that we had all week. But it was ok, we were watching baseball.

It was at this point in the evening, when we realized that we had eaten our way through the first 4 innings. We then began to notice two security guards, which walked back and forth, back and forth, right in front of us. The “lady” guard walked in front of “baby Huey” guard, neither one of them looking to the left or to the right, just straight ahead. We became so interested in them that we missed a homerun. We noticed that Baby Huey guard was probably not over the age of 25 and maybe was in training. If lady guard stopped, he stopped, when lady guard walked, he walked, always the same amount of space between them.  Baby Huey must have weighed over 300 lbs and I must say that there was no way he would have been able to run for help or chase anyone trying to steal 3rd base. I truly am in horrible physical shape and over weight. The heaviest thing I can probably lift would be a extra large piece of cheesecake to my mouth. The only time I even try to run is when the blue light comes on at KMart, but I am here to tell you, I think I would be able to beat Baby Huey to be first in line at the hamburger stand. It didn’t give us a sense of security at all. We both sat there and wondered, “what is the biggest size of security uniforms made”? As we watched the snack guys running up and down the stands, yelling, “hot dogs, cotton candy, ice cream”, we talked among ourselves about why didn’t they make these guys the security people? They are able to run up and down the stairs without having to carry an oxygen tank with them. They can throw a hot dog through the air like it was a feather. If a terrorist was running after me, I would vote for the hot dog guy to come to my aid any day before Baby Huey. At least he could stuff cotton candy down the terrorist throat, giving me a chance to hide under the hot dog cart. So we came away, knowing that we will be writing to the NBL with our suggestion that they switch the roles. Snack guys would become security people, baby Huey’s would become snack guys.

Ok, that is off my chest I can post the recipe that I am making tonight. We are headed to watch Forever Plaid and need to eat and run (well, not like the hot dog guys, we will take the car). This is a quick easy recipe that uses store bought rotisserie chicken.

1 (8 oz) package wide egg noodles

1 teas paprika

1 teas dried thyme leaves, crumbled

1/2 teas salt

1/2 teas pepper

3 tables butter

1 large onion, chopped

1 (16 oz) package mushrooms, cleaned and sliced

2 tsp minced garlic

1 (10 3/4 oz) cream of mushroom soup

1 cup milk

1/3 cup dry white wine (or more milk if you don’t want to use wine)

1 rotisserie chicken cut into serving pieces

1 tables chopped fresh parsley

Prepare noodles as directed on package. Set aside and keep warm

Stir together paprika, dried thyme, salt and pepper in a small bowl. Melt butter in large skillet over medium heat. Add onion and mushrooms and sauté 8-10 minutes or until onion is tender. Stir in garlic and paprika mixture. Saute 2 more minutes. Add soup, milk and wine. Bring to just beginning to boil stage, stirring frequently. Add chicken pieces. spoon sauce over top of chicken. Reduce to a low and simmer for 10-15 minutes.

Stir in 1 tables parsley. Serve over hot cooked noodles.

Serves: 4

Desserts · Fruit

Key Lime Bars

Chocolate Castles2 Comments

When you can’t have Houston’s Key Lime pie, go for these. These bars can even be frozen for later use or when you are just wanting to get them out of sight so you don’t eat the whole pan. Then you can just take a couple out (or 5) whenever you have a craving for them.
1 1/4 cup flour
30 vanilla wafers, broken into pieces
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1/2 cup chopped pecans
3/4 cup cold butter, cubed
In a food processor, combine the four, wafers, powdered sugar and pecans. Cover and process until nuts are finely ground. Add butter, cover and pulse until crumbly.
Press into an ungreased 13×9 baking dish. Bake at 350 for 15-18 min or until lightly browned. Cool on a wire rack.
In a small bowl, combine the following:
1 (8 oz) package of cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup sugar
2 tables milk (or cream)
1 teas vanilla
Beat these ingredients until well blended and spread over cooled crust.
Key Lime Layer
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/4 cup flour
4 eggs
1/2 cup lime juice
Combine sugar and flour; whisk in eggs and lime juice. Gently pour over cream cheese layer.
Bake at 350 for 20-25 min or until filling is set. Cool on rack. Refrigerate for at least one hour or until chilled.
Before serving, sprinkle a with powdered sugar. Cut into squares.
Yields: 3 dz small squares

Chocolate · Cookies · Desserts

Brownie Tassies

Chocolate Castles3 Comments

Just made a batch of these to take to a meeting. They are perfect to just pick up with your fingers and pop them in your mouth. They resemble the brownie bites you buy at the store but these, of course, have the buttery flavor and a soft gooey middle. You can actually change the flavor from vanilla extract to almond, or cherry or what ever tickles your fancy

3/4 cup flour, 1/4 cup cocoa

1/3 cup cold butter

2-3 tables water (it took all 3 today)

In a small bowl, stir together the flour, 1/3 cup sugar, cocoa and salt. Cut in the 1/3 cup cold butter with pastry blended or 2 forks until mixture resembles crumbs. Sprinkle water, a tables at a time and stir dough into a ball. Divide the ball into 24 balls. Place one in each of the lightly greased mini-muffin tins (unless you are using the Teflon coated, then you will not need to grease). Pressing with your finger (this is easier if you dip your finger each time in flour so dough doesn’t stick to your finger), make a well in the balls, pushing some of the dough up the sides of the tin also. Set aside when you have done all 24.

Filling: 1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

2 tables butter

1/3 cup sugar

1 egg

1 teas vanilla (or cherry or almond)

1/2 teas cinnamon

Melt chocolate chips and butter together in microwave bowl, on high for 30 second intervals.  Stir until chips are completely melted. Stir in sugar, egg and vanilla.

Divide the filling between the 24 cups.

Place tins in a 325 preheated oven for 20-25 minutes. (Mine today took 18 but I used just the thin metal pans, the dark Teflon ones will probably take longer)

Cool for 10 minutes and then loosen around edges with a knife or fork. Set on wire racks to cool. These can also be made ahead and frozen.

Desserts · Fruit

Not Your Mama’s Banana Pudding

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Randy has been asking me to make banana pudding for the last couple of weeks, but being the sensitive, giving person I am, I ended up making the desserts that are what I wanted. So..today was the day. We are going to dinner at a friends house tonight and I am taking the dessert. If I am going to have banana pudding, I want it kicked up a notch, so here dear friends is the version that I end up licking the bowl, the spoon and stay away from the scales for a week after I eat it. This is much richer than the normal one, which makes me love it. Because I don’t care much for vanilla wafers, I used Lorna crushed Lorna Doone cookies.

2 boxes (4 oz ea) white chocolate instant pudding (or 1 white chocolate and 1 banana, if you like more of a banana flavor)
1 cup ice cold water
2 cups cold milk
1 (14 oz) sweetened condensed milk (not evaporated) (or 2 cans if you want it really rich) ( I like to use 1 1/2 cans as I love the flavor of sweetened milk)
1 cup whipping cream, whipped
3 bananas
1 (10 oz) box Lorna Doone shortbread cookies (any short bread will work)

Mix pudding mixes with milk and water. When thick, add condensed milk and mix until thoroughly combined. Fold in the 2 cups whipped cream.
Spread a layer of the crushed cookies on the bottom of your serving dish. Pour 1 cup of the pudding mixture over the cookies and then layer a sliced banana over the pudding. Repeat layers until all the pudding is used. Top with whipping cream and then sprinkle a few of the cookie crumbs over the top.

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Dark Chocolate Cupcakes With Cherry Frosting

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Paula’s done it again. This recipe combines two great flavors.  Cherry & Chocolate

Taken from her Jan/Feb, 2012 issue, these are truly decadent.

1 cup butter

6 (1 oz) squares semisweet chocolate, chopped

1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

1 1/4 cups sugar

4 large eggs

2 cups flour

1 teas baking powder

1 teas salt

1/2 teas baking soda

1 1/2 cups buttermilk

Cherry Buttercream Frosting

Preheat oven to 350. Line 24 cupcake pans with paper liners.

In medium saucepan, combine butter, chopped chocolate and cocoa powder.

Cook over medium heat, stirring frequently until chocolate is melted and smooth. Cool for 15 minutes.

In a large bowl, beat sugar and eggs at high speed with mixer until thick and pale.

In a small bowl, combine flour, baking powder, salt and baking soda. Gradually add to sugar mixture alternately with buttermilk, beginning and ending with flour mixture. Beat just until combined after each addition. Stir in butter-chocolate mixture.

Spoon batter into prepared muffin cups. Bake for 14-16 min or until a toothpick inserted in center of one cupcake comes out clean. Cool completely and then frost with the cherry buttercream.

Cherry Buttercream

1 1/2 cups sugar

6 egg whites

2 cups unsalted butter, softened

1/4 cup maraschino cherry-flavored syrup

In top of double boiler, whisk sugar and egg whites until combined. Cook over simmering water until mixture reaches 140 on a candy thermometer; do not stir. Immediately pour mixture into the bowl of a heavy duty stand mixer. Beat at high speed for 10 minutes. Reduce speed to medium low. With mixer running, add butter, 2 tables at a time, beating just until combined after each addition. Add cherry-flavored syrup, beating until combined. Keep buttercream at room temperature until ready to frost cupcakes.

Makes 24 cupcakes

Breakfast · Casseroles · Meats

Summer Overnight Biscuit, Sausage & Apple Casserole

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Because it is summer we tend to want foods that are “lighter” in texture, but still full flavored and filling. Sausage casseroles tend to be a little heavy for summer liking, but when I found this one, because of the chopped apple (I tend to think that anything that has fruit in it makes it automatically healthier, never paying attention to the other ingredients. I just tell myself that, “well it has fruit in it, it must be healthy”), it just sounded like a summer casserole. Plus, it uses up those cans of biscuits in your fridge that are almost out of date.

2 pounds of Jimmy Dean mild sausage or sage flavored

2 tart apples, cored and siced

6 cups torn or cut baked biscuits in 1″ pieces

9 eggs, beaten

1/2 teas Dijon mustard

1 1/2 cups grated sharp cheddar cheese

3 cups milk

Salt & Pepper to taste

Fry the sausage in a skillet, breaking it up as it cooks. Drain, reserving the fat, and let sausage cool,

Saute the apples in the reserved fat; remove from pan and cool.

Move the biscuit pieces to a large resealable plastic bag. Whisk together the eggs, mustard, cheese and milk in a large bowl. Stir in cooled sausage and apples. season to taste with salt and pepper. Transfer the mixture to the plastic bag. Place the bag inside another resealable plastic bag with zipper facing opposite direction to prevent leaks. Refrigerate at least 2 hours, but preferably overnight or up to 2 days.

When ready to bake, preheat oven to 350. Pour mixture into a buttered 13×9 baking dish or divide between 2 (1 1/2 qt) casserole dishes, that have been greased.

Bake covered 30 minutes. Uncover and bake another 30 min or until eggs are set.

Cakes · Desserts · Fruit

Lemon Bar Cheesecake

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Friday evening we are having some friends over for dinner. When I came across this recipe from Southern Living Feb issue, I knew it would be our dessert for tonight. I love saving the magazines and going back through them. It reminds me of different scriptures that you have read a million times in the Bible, but just when you are needing a certain word from the Lord, you come across the same scripture and it just has a whole new meaning, depending on your circumstances. It is just the Word you are needing to hear. So it is with old recipes, you can read them a hundred times, but sometimes one just sticks out to you as you are going through your recipe stack and there it is…the perfect recipe you have been looking for.

As Southerners,  we love our Bible, a true treasure and God’s love letter to us. Southern Living Magazine is a gift to us also, provides us with treasured recipes, which made with love, we share with our families and friends. This will be a favorite and treasured recipe.

If you use a dark springform pan, it will ensure a golden brown crust without having to bake before adding the filling.

2 cups flour

1/2 cup powdered sugar

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 cup cold butter, cubed

2 egg yolks

1 to 2 tables ice-cold water

4 (8 oz) softened cream cheese

1 cup sugar

4 large eggs

2 teas vanilla

2 cups Lemon Curd, divided (I use already prepared lemon curd I get at grocery store)

Candied Lemon Slices (opt)

Pulse first 3 ingredients in a food processor 3-4 times or just until blended. Add butter and pulse 5-6 times or until crumbly. Whisk together 2 egg yolks and 1 tables ice-cold water in a small bowl; add to butter mixture and process until dough forms a ball and pulls away from sides of bowl, adding up to 1 tables remaining ice-cold water if necessary. Shape dough into a disk; wrap in plastic and chill at least 4 hours (up to 24 hours).

Roll dough into a 14″ circle on a lightly floured surface. Fit dough into a lightly greased 9″ dark springform pan; trim and discard excess dough. Chill 30 mins.

Preheat oven to 325. Beat cream cheese at medium speed with mixer 3 min or until smooth. Gradually add sugar, beating until blended. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating just until yellow disappears after each addition. Beat in vanilla.

Pour 2/3 of cheesecake batter (about 4 cups) into prepared crust; dollop 1 cup lemon curd over batter in pan and gently swirl with a knife. Spoon remaining batter into pan.

Bake at 325 for 1 hour to 1 hour 10 min or just until center is set. Turn oven off. Let cheesecake stand in oven with door closed for 15 minutes. Remove cheesecake from oven and gently run a knife around outer edge to loosen sides of pan. Do not remove sides of the pan. Cool completely in pan on a wire rack about 1 hour. Cover and chill at least 8 hours.

Remove sides of pan and transfer to a serving plate. Spoon remaining 1 cup lemon curd over top of cheesecake. If desired top with candied lemon slices and whipped cream.

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Here A Cheerio, There A Cheerio, Everywhere A Cheerio

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Cheerio Treats

Melt In microwave:

3 tables butter

10 oz miniature marshmallows

1/2 cup peanut butter, creamy or crunchy

Add:

5 cups plain cheerios

1 cup M&M’s

Mix well and quickly. It cools before you realize and becomes unworkable.

Press into long glass pyrex 9×13 (greased) pan. Cool and cut into squares.

The kids drove out of the driveway this morning and all is quiet on the home front. Except for the crunch every time I step on a Cheerio or petrified blueberry muffin from a few days ago. All that remains are sticky little fingerprints all over the place. Now I do have to admit that they are the cutest little fingerprints that you have every seen, but…because of how sticky they are, they will probably remain for quite some time, as it will take a couple of cleaning jobs to get them all off.

As they were walking out the door with the last of the bags, Caleb, the 3 year old, looked at me and began to tear up. My heart just melted. I picked him up and told him that Nana would come see him before too long or he could come back here whenever they wanted to come. I started to tear up and it was such an emotional moment until…he said that he needed to whisper to his mom. Of course, I knew what he would be whispering, “do I really have to leave Nana, I will miss her so much, please don’t make me go.” But because he was now crying full throttle, she had to ask him about 3 times what he was saying. Tears are still running down my cheek as my heart is breaking that he is hurting, having to leave. All of a sudden, Jodi begins to laugh and tells me that I can quit crying. He was upset because he was having to leave my Ipad. He said that my Ipad had more games on it and he didn’t want to leave the Ipad.

Once again, my bubble is burst. We all began to laugh, as we carried him downstairs to the minivan. (yes the same one that carried Thelma and Louise across the desert a few weeks ago).

The floors are now clean, the fingerprints are almost gone and the house is quiet. Guess I will sit and play one of Caleb’s games on my Ipad for a while. It’s weird. I thought for sure I would be glad when I didn’t have to share it with Caleb.  But I guess it wasn’t so bad having to share it.  I already miss his cute little voice saying, “let’s get this party started.” After being with them for 8 days, I almost don’t know what to do with myself. All the “breakables” are already put back in place and no more dirty diapers from Noah to remind me to take the trash out. Think I will go make the Cheerio treats now.  If there is not enough left in the box, I will gather the ones up that I have found in every nook and cranny.