Oreo Cream Cheese Cookies

I know I have not updated in a while! I thought I would just post my favorite recipe I've done in a while.

Oreo Cream Cheese Cookies:

6 oz Cream Cheese
2 Sticks Butter
2 Cups Granulated Sugar
2 Cups Flour
2 tsp Vanilla
2 Cups Crushed Oreos

--Cream Butter and Cheese
-- Add Sugar and Vanilla
--Eat some of this Mixture, it is to die for
--Add Flour
--Eat more
--Roll individual cookies in crushed Oreos
--Bake at 375* for about 12 minutes

In the future, I will probably make these cookies without the Oreo step. Believe me, I LOVE OREOS, but the cookies are so good without them! I would rather eat them separately. YUM!

Blueberry Cream Cheese Bread

I do not care to write out the entire recipe for the sake of this blog post. Prep was long, there were a lot of very specific directions, but MAN was it worth it! This bread is YUMMY! Granted, I did not have a bread tin, so I made one out of tin foil and that made it look very ugly. That means no final picture. You will survive. 

This bread was a yummy blend of a sweet bread recipe, chalk full of blueberries, with a center of cream cheese yummy filling-ness. I made it a few hours before everyone went to bed and half of it is already gone! I rate this recipe an 8. 

Coconut Vanilla Rice Pudding

Coconut Vanilla Rice Pudding

Ingredients:
1 1/2 Cups Rice
1 1/2 Cups Coconut Milk
2 Cups Milk
1/2 Cup Sugar
Pinch of Salt
1 Vanilla Bean (insides scraped out)

Directions:
Cook Rice
Add all ingredients into pot, simmer on med-low for 40 minutes

This recipe was very easy, in fact, what you see above was written from memory. I rate it a 5. I enjoyed the rice, but it was not spectacular. I could see this being something yummy to fix my chittlins for breakfast to break the monotony of cereal. 

Salted Caramel Shortbread

Salted Caramel Shortbread 

Shortbread:
10 tbsp unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1 egg yolk
1-2/3 cups flour

Caramel:
1 cup unsalted butter
1 cup light brown sugar
3/4 cup light corn syrup
2 tsp sea salt, plus more for sprinkling on top
4 tbsp sugar
4 tbsp heavy cream
1-1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Directions:

Grease an 8×8″ pan

In a large bowl, combine the butter, sugar, and salt with a pastry cutter or fork. Add the egg yolk and continue mixing.

Add the flour and use your hands to combine the dough until coarse crumbs form. Transfer the dough into the prepared pan and press it down into one even layer.

Refrigerate for 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and bake for 25 minutes, until slightly golden brown. Set aside to cool.

For the caramel, combine the butter, brown sugar, corn syrup, salt, sugar, and heavy cream. Bring to a boil and stir for about 5-10 minutes until caramel has thickened

Remove from heat, stir in the vanilla and pour caramel over the shortbread.

Refrigerate for at least 3 hours, then sprinkle with sea salt and cut into squares.

On a scale of 1-10 I rate this recipe a 7. These morsels are yummy! My issue with the recipe was ratios. The caramel totally overpowered the shortbread, because each bite has twice as much caramel! Not that I am complaining, because the caramel is stinking delicious. In the future, I would half the caramel portion of this recipe. Definitely worth making!

Joe's Crab Shack Crab Dip

I have been blessed with attorneys as parents. I have also been blessed with parents who love to serve. These two things mixed together equal our family sometimes receiving seemingly random gifts for free legal work my parents have done. One that might be my favorite that they have ever received is the 10 pounds of King Crab legs they were just given. This is fresh out of Alaska, flash frozen, King Crab and holy cow is it delicious. I had a recipe on Pinterest for some crab dip and when I realized we had fresh delicious crab, I went right to work!

Joe's Crab Shack Crab Dip

6 oz Cream Cheese
1 Cup Sour Cream
4 TBSP Mayo
4 TBSP Butter
1/2 tsp Paprika
1/2 tsp Salt
3/4 cup Mozzarella Cheese
Chopped Onion (to taste)
6 oz crab meat

Mix together cream cheese, sour cream, mayo and butter until smooth
Stir in salt and paprika
Then add the crab, onion and Mozzarella 
Place in baking dish and bake at 350 for 10-15 minutes
Serve hot!

On a scale of 1-10 I rate this recipe 7. The base is good and can be used for any other kind of creamy dip. Replace paprika with garlic, crab with artichoke, and you will have a yummy artichoke dip! This recipe is worth making and eating at least one time! It would definitely be a crowd pleaser at any party. Don't use smoked paprika. 


(These legs are as long as our stove top!)

Pinterest Program

I have three months at home before I begin the greatest 18 months of my life. I thought over what I would spend my three months doing. Some of the ideas that crossed my mind were: staying at school, dating a boy, going back to work, moving to Anacortes, volunteering, tutoring and doing nothing. I still have not quite decided what to do with my time, but several of those have been knocked out. There is one thing that I have decide to do, however, and that is pinterest. I have compiled all of my pinterest recipes (which have taken me a good year to collect) into a list and am going to work through each of them, until I leave in March. I love food, so why not spend my time making it? I plan on making myself a cookbook so I am ready to be a wife when I get home from the mish! These are all righteous goals right? :) 

Additionally, I am going to blog about them. Keeping a blog is hard for me, as is keeping a journal, because I do not like to talk about myself--which is strange considering how much I like to talk. But now, my blog has a purpose! I hope everyone reading this likes food as much as I do!

Myself

I have learned something about myself since I have been at school. Actually, I have learned several things. In fact, it is remarkable the amount I have learned about myself in just the short time I have been here. I will save all those for another post. Today I want to focus on what I have learned as result of living with five other girls.

I always thought my biggest fear was being alone and in part it still is, but what I have realized since living here is I LOVE being alone. Holy cow, I took advantage of being an only child for 5 years as well as having older siblings who didn't want to play with me as a child. Oh the joy of walking into a house that no one is in and just sitting. The quiet. How I miss being able to sing out loud without worrying that someone was listening.

When I am home alone I just sit and think "Perfect. Life is perfect." I blame my father for this quality of enjoying solitude.