7-Up Cake

This cake is a very light lemon flavored bundt cake. My husband loves it and we could only find it on occasion at a few stores. The last store we found it was at Costco. So I was on the search for a good bundt cake recipe and found this one on line at recipes4cakes.com. It turned out super yummy so I thought I would share.

1 1/2 cup butter
3 cups sugar
5 eggs
3 cups flour
2TB lemon extract
3/4 can 7up

Cream butter and sugar together for 20 minutes or until smooth blend is achieved. Add eggs one at a time. Add flour & lemon extract. Fold in 7 up.

Pour into greased bundt pan and bake @ 325 for 1 hour & 15 mins.

I found that that was a little too long to bake so the edges were a little crispy but my family liked that.

This recipe didn't call for a glaze on top so I just made the classic glaze and it made it perfect.

2 cups confectioners sugar
1 TB soft butter
1 tsp vanilla extract
2-3 TB milk

Combine sugar and butter. Add vanilla; stir in milk gradually to achieve desired consistency and stir until smooth. Pour/drizzle over top of warm bundt cake.

Bowtie Festival Pasta

This one is inspired from the dish at Johnny Carino's. Bow tie Festival is my husband's favorite thing on the menu. We modified a cheese sauce recipe from one in the Betty Crocker cook book, and added everything we thought was in the dish.

Cook 1 package of chicken tenders (cut into bite size pieces) with 3 - 4 strips of Bacon (also cut into bite size pieces) in a frying pan, and 1/2 red onion (red onion optional.) over medium heat
While cooking chicken, boil 16 oz of Bow tie Pasta. When chicken and bacon is cooked, turn heat to low and add 1clove of garlic, and 1 large diced tomato (2 small)
(I usually double the sauce- we like our Pasta creamy) In a separate sauce pan, melt 2 TBSP Butter over medium/medium low heat
Add 1 clove of garlic, and 2 TBSP Flour to Butter to make a rue.
Add 1 Cup of Half and Half to rue and stir constantly until sauce becomes thick. Cook for 1 more minute. Add 1 Cup of 4 Blend Italian Shredded Cheese to sauce. Stir until melted. Add Salt and Pepper to taste.
Drain Pasta.
Combine Pasta, Sauce, and Chicken/Bacon Mix.
Goes Great with Garlic Bread and Caesar Salad.

(Yea- I am finally a contributor not a recipe stealer!)

Laurel’s Cheesecake Ball

I don't know who Laurel is. My cousin sent this around to the fam. Thought all you cheesecake lovers might enjoy it.

Recipe makes two Cheesecake Balls!

1-8 oz brick cream cheese
1 cube butter (not margarine)
4-4 ½ cups powdered sugar
¼ tsp cinnamon
¾ tsp Mexican vanilla OR 1 tsp regular vanilla
¾ cup finely chopped pecans
¾ cup Heath toffee bits (in a bag on the baking aisle)
¾ cup MINI semi sweet chocolate chips
1 pre-made Oreo pie crust-(store bought)
Honey Maid graham cracker Sticks (honey and/or chocolate flavor for dipping)

Let cream cheese and butter sit out at room temperature about one hour to soften. (Don’t soften in microwave as it makes the mixing consistency too soft). Unwrap Oreo pie crust and crush well with a fork down to fine crumbs, leave inside pie tin and set aside. Cream butter and cream cheese together with powdered sugar, cinnamon, and vanilla until well mixed and fluffy. Add nuts, toffee and chocolate chips and mix well. Put cheesecake mixture into freezer for 30 minutes to harden. Take out of freezer and split in half. With spoon, shape one half into a ball shape and drop into center of Oreo crumbs. Use spoon to further shape and then cover cheesecake mixture well with crumbs. Wrap in Saran Wrap and finish shape into perfect ball and refrigerate for at least two hours before serving. Repeat with second half of cheesecake mixture. Serve with chocolate and/or regular graham cracker sticks.

Variations:

Raspberry White Chocolate Cheesecake Ball -

Instead of chocolate chips and toffee, substitute broken up, frozen raspberry pieces and shaved white chocolate and nuts of your choice. Use a regular graham cracker pie crust (crushed) for the coating.

Rocky Road Cheesecake Ball -

Instead of chocolate chips and toffee, mix in 1 T. of cocoa, chopped almonds, toasted coconut and mini marshmallows (quartered with scissors). Omit cinnamon and half the vanilla. Use Oreo crumbs as coating.

Peanut Butter Chocolate Cheesecake Ball -

Omit toffee, cinnamon and half the vanilla. Add 1/3 cup smooth peanut butter to cheesecake mixture, ½ cup finely chopped peanuts and ¾ cup mini semi sweet chocolate chips. Use Oreo Crumbs as coating.

Sunday Morning Sweet Rolls

I found this on another recipe blog and tried it out and it was wonderful!

1 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 cup butter
About 18 Rhodes frozen bread rolls

The night before, put sugar, butter and cinnamon in sauce pan and bring to boil. Cook for 4 minutes. Place frozen rolls in bundt pan, pour sugar mixture over the rolls. Leave on kitchen counter over night. In the morning bake in pre-heated oven at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes.

Ice Cream Sandwich Torte

This is a delicious Pampered Chef recipe. It's super easy, but looks likes you spend a lot of time on it. It's also delicious (did I already mention that?)

1 cup coarsely chopped creme-filled chocolate sandwich cookies or Oreos (about 10 cookies)
1/2 cup milk
1 pkg (3.9 oz) chocolate instant pudding and pie filling
1 container (12 oz) frozen whipped topping, thawed, divided
12 frozen ice cream sandwiches (3.75 ounces each), unwrapped, divided
2 Tablespoons semi-sweet chocolate morsels, grated or multi-colored sprinkles

1. Coarsely chop cookies. Combine milk and pudding mix; whisk together until mixture is smooth and beings to thicken. Fold in half of the whipped topping and cookies; set filling aside

2. Working quickly, arrange six of the ice cream sandwiches side by side. Spread filling evenly over sandwiches. Top with remaining ice cream sandwiches, forming a rectangular-shaped torte; smooth sides. Spread remaining whipped topping over top and sides of torte. Grate chocolate over torte. Freeze at least 30 minutes or until ready to serve.

Yield: 16 servings

Cook's Tip: If freezing torte overnight, remove from freezer 30-45 minutes before serving for easier slicing.

Peanut Butter Cup 'Cups'

I found this recipe on another recipe blog - but for the life of me can't remember which one.
In her recipe she says to roll the dough into balls and put them into the mini muffin tins. I don't know if I beat mine too long or what - but my dough was soooo sticky, there was no way to roll it into balls, so I just put 'dollop's' into the muffin tins - still turned out okay. The top picture is from the blog, the bottom picture is mine. Also, she said not to grease the mini muffin tins. I used the "flour" spray - I didn't want to risk it. And, I would recommend having your kids help, or start unwrapping the peanut butter cups before you even start this recipe. One of the small bags of cups has about 41 cups in it.





Ingredients:
1 3/4 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup peanut butter
1 egg, beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 tablespoons milk
40 Miniature Reese's Peanut Butter Cups

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees
2. Sift together flour, salt, and baking soda; set aside
3. Cream together the butter, sugar, peanut butter and brown sugar until fluffy. Beat in the egg, vanilla and milk. Add the flour mixture; mix well.
4. Shape into 40 balls and place each into an ungreased mini muffin tin.
5. Back at 375 degrees for about 8 minutes. Remove from oven and immediately press a mini peanut butter cup into each ball. Cool and carefully remove from pan.

Mignon's Hot Ham & Swiss Rolls

My friend Mignon (who doesn't blog unfortunately) made these when she played bunco with a bunch of us. We miss her terribly!

2 dozen small rolls
8 oz Swiss cheese
8 oz ham
1 1/2 tablespoons poppy seeds
1 1/2 tablespoons prepared mustard
1 stick of butter
1/2 teaspoon minced onion

Cut in half spread mayo on all rolls with a piece of ham and swiss. Melt butter and combine the remaining ingredients. Assemble rolls in 9x13 pan(you will have to squeeze them together to get them to fit) Pour mixture over top of rolls and bake at 350 degrees for 15 minutes.

*Let sit until butter is no longer runny!

YUM!

Darn Good Chocolate Cake

I got this recipe from my sweet friend Megan that I work with and adore! :)

1 pkg (18.5 oz) devils food or dark fudge cake mix
1 pkg (3.9 oz) chocolate instant pudding mix
4 large eggs
1 cup sour cream or fat-free plain yogurt
1/2 cup warm water
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease bundt pan. Place cake mix, pudding, eggs, sour cream, warm water and oil in large mixing bowl. Blend at low speed 1 minute. Stop machine and scrape down sides of bowl with rubber spatula. Increase mixer speed to med and beat 2-3 minutes scraping sides of bowl if needed. Batter should look thick and well combined. Fold in Chocolate chips. Pour batter into bundt pan. Bake for 45-50 minutes-or until cake springs back when lightly touched and starts to pull away from sides of pan. Place on rack to cool for 20-30 minutes. Run knife around edge and invert onto rack or serving platter and slice and serve while warm. Dust with powdered sugar or serve with whipped topping.

Homemade Root Beer

I got this recipe from this awesome cook book called "The Domestic Art Vol.2" it's a wonderful cook book where I've found some great recipes I can't wait to try out and pass along to you!

1 gallon Water (16 cups)
2 cups sugar
2 Tablespoons root beer extract
2 lbs. dry ice

Use platic spoon to mix water, sugar and extract together in a 2-gallon plastic cooler or other wide-mouth platic container. Carefully add dry ice. Let stand 20 minutes until dry ice has evaporated. Makes 1 gallon.