Buttercream Butter Dream

Creamy dreamy buttercream. Oh, my lovely butter dream. Everything tastes better with butter. Everything tastes better with cream. And if you disagree, you're probably just trying to convince yourself because of the guilt-potential. :-P

I made buttercream frosting for the first time today. It's 228 calories per serving, but they're super dee duper delicious calories! Is it totally crazy to eat veggies for every meal just so I can eat buttercream frosting? Umm yeah.

The buttercream adventure began with my disatisfaction with Oatmeal Cream Pies. Plastic comes to mind when eating them. Plastic and sugar.  so when the whole box was gone, I decided to invent my own non-industrial version.

First, I made oatmeal chocolate raisen cookies. They didn't come out as flat as I wanted, so a little more experimenting is needed. Oh darn. ;-)

Next came the buttercream frosting to be sandwhiched between two cookies.

I found an amazingly simple and noisy recipe. One stick of butter {mmmmmmmm}, 2 cups powdered sugar {10X sugar is what the hardcore buttercreamists call it}, a bit of vanilla, 2 tbsp. of milk. Using a noisy mixer, cream {fancy word for mix} the butter, then slowly add the sugar, next the vanilla and milk, and voila! Buttercream that will make you use the word "buttercream" in every song....if you're lyricists like my crazy family pretend to be.

My hubby is playing the guitar and singing these lyrics with Aurora as I type. Here are a few gems:

"I like it....on my cake
  I like it....on my steak

  I will eat it....with a carrot
  I might even....share it

  Ohhhhh I like buttercream,
  I like buttercream."

And the lyrics go on and on and on in Dr. Seuss style.

Needless to say, buttercream frosting will be made on a semi-regular basis in this house...

{I secretly saved a cookie sandwich to take a picture of, which is coming soon!}

Super Deliciousnous!

He just could stop himself. The moment the sweet deliciousness touched his tongue, he was addicted! No one thought they looked like anything special, including me. It was a simple, mostly pre-packaged recipe, but oh so freaking fabulous!

For the 4th of July, my fam went to our daughter Aurora's best friend's house. Aurora and Lilia were smitten with each other since day one of preschool, and they had a BLAST watching fireworks and playing with glow necklaces! It was Lilia's brother Ren who was smitten with the dessert we brought.

The cookies we brought were Aurora's creation. She drew a picture of what she wanted them to look like:

What a creative mind! She's simply amazing!

Here's Aurora's recipe, which is not from scratch (my favorable method, but we were limited on time)...

Ingredients

Sugar Cookie Mix (plus all the necessary additions)

Pre-made CREAM CHEESE frosting (again, I would have preferred making my own, chemistry set-free :-P )

Blueberries

Strawberries

Powdered Sugar (granulated would work too)

Directions

Follow Sugar Cookie Mix Directions

If you wish, roll out dough and cut into fun shapes. We did stars for the 4th of July!

Bake, then let cool

Place Strawberries and Blueberries in a bowl and coat lightly with sugar

Spread a thin layer (or thick, as my hubby prefers) on each cookie

Top cookies with blueberries and strawberries, and voila!

Now try this and tell me you could resist it...I think it's pretty impossible!

xo
jbnewcomb<3

Porkin' Out!

I'm a major carnivore. I'm not proud of it, but it's a fact. I just loooove me some meat!

I tried going vegetarian after my friend enlightened me to the horrors of slaughterhouses. Just the word slaughterhouse invokes guilt in me.

After a couple days of eating soy-based foods, I got really sick. I had no energy and I felt like I was dying. It was the weirdest feeling, so I said flip-it, I'm a carnivore.

I'll blame my cravings, my NEED for meat, on my type-O blood. Ever read that book Eat Right for Your Type? Well, type-O is supposedly the oldest in the evolution of humans. Basically, cave men were type-O.

The newest type is AB, and they function well on a vegetarian diet. My friend who sent me the terrifying animal-killing videos is an AB. See where I'm going with this? ;-)

When I was growing up, I ate beef almost every day. Mmmm rib eyes are my absolute favorite! (I kinda loathe myself for loving it so much.)

Now that I'm head chef in my household ;-) I am cooking lots of interesting dishes, and lately, I've been really into pork tenderloin.

Pork is great with mustard. I never thought I'd like it on anything, but mustard in cooking is so different than on a hot dog or burger.

I'm also not a huge fan of rosemary, so I am hyper-conscious of not using too much, and my hubby thinks I'm a master spicer now...is that a word? It is now!

Here's one of my latest pork faves...my mostly vegetarian friend tried it (she's a funny bunny like that)...and she absolutely LOVED it...

This recipe is from All Recipes but I always change it because I'm cool like that. hahaha

Apple Rosemary Pork Tenderloin

Ingredients



Pork Tenderloin (Any size, really)

1-2 tbsp mustard (depending on size)

1/2 cup unsweetened apple sauce

6-8 minced garlic cloves (depending on size)

about 1/2 tbsp dried rosemary

salt and pepper

Directions

Preheat oven to 325F.

Place pork tenderloin in pan, sprinkle salt and pepper on it, and cook in over for an hour to lock in juices.

Mix mustard, apple sauce, garlic, and rosemary together in a bowl.

Thoroughly spread sauce mixture over pork.

Put back into oven until meat thermometer reads proper temp.

(I cook a 3-4lb tenderloin for about 40 minutes to an hour with the sauce on it.)

If you like pork, this is sure to become a favorite! SOOOooooo yummy! Makes my mouth water just typing the recipe out. :-)

Enjoy....

And because I have yet to take photos of my dishes before the fam (or I) devour them instantly, here's another one of the latest Newcomb carnivore (or maybe not, who knows?) ;-) Thanks for taking this, Grandma Leila!

These dimples make me melt!

xo

jbnewcomb<3

Mole! Chocolate in Mexican Food

Only because of a Dora the Explorer episode did I know that chocolate was used in Mexican cooking. I love the way chocolate sounds in spanish: chaw-co-la-tay! Mmmmm...sounds even yummier!

I have an enormous amount of cocoa powder leftover from a Sam's shopping trip I made when I'd had the intentions of baking cookies for my whole family and closest friends. This was around the time I started getting serious about cooking, but still hadn't realized how much work it is to make 15 dozen cookies (and not eat them all).

My favorite recipes site is All Recipes because, among many reasons, you can search by ingredient(s). I searched "cocoa powder" in the main dish section, and came up with Mole sauce. Now another great thing about this site is that people rate and review recipes and always have some tips to offer to make the recipe even better. I always read these because 99 times out of 100, people rate the recipe based on what they did, and not what the recipe called for.

Mole sauce sounded fabulous! Chocolate on meat! I've died and gone to heaven! I changed the recipe according to the comments and because I am starting to better understand cooking in general, I added my own twist. ;-)




Mole Sauce:
Ingredients
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 cup chopped onion
6 garlic cloves, minced
About 1 cup tomato sauce
1 10oz (maybe 10.75?) can of green chiles and diced tomatoes
2 heaping tablespoons cocoa powder
2 tablespoons cinnamon (sounds like a lot, but it's perfect!)
2 teaspoons cumin

Directions
Heat the oil in a medium saucepan over medium heat, and cook the onion until tender, add garlic and cook for a minute or two, but don't let it brown. Mix in cocoa powder, cinnamon, and cumin. Stir in the tomato sauce and green chiles and tomatoes. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer 10 minutes. Transfer to a gravy boat or pour directly over food to serve.

I've been loving to cook chicken in a way I saw on the Barefoot Contessa, so I layered half the mole sauce on the bottom of a baking dish and placed boned chicken thighs (you can use boned breasts too) and cooked them at 400 degrees until the thermometer read the proper temperature. After the chicken was done, I served it with mole on top! BIG HIT in my house! Let me know if you tried it!

Cocoa pods...I wonder if these can grow in Florida!

xo
jbnewcomb<3