The perfect Saturday brunch

Last night we were watching TV when a commercial for IHOP came on for their new fruit Crêpes and P turned to me and said 'mom, can we go to IHOP for Crêpes?' I looked at him with horror in my eyes.. as if I would go to IHOP for Crêpes when they're so simple to make at home. I remember making crepes with my grandma when I was little and we would put all kinds of things inside them... my favorite is Orange Marmalade and a little dab of butter. Well, since the kid didn't roll out of bed until almost noon (Remember people, he's 12 and the boy likes to sleep, lol) he came into my room, gave me the usual morning kiss and hug and uttered two words to me with love in his eyes.. "Crêpes... Please" I, of course obliged to my only son who hasn't eaten since around 8:00 last night with a Crêpe recipe I had in my cookbook binder from who knows where.

Alright, Now, back to the Crêpes.. this recipe here states that it makes 7 Crêpes.. I got about 15 out of this recipe though using my 6" circulon pan.

Crêpes

15 min | 5 min prep

7 crepes

• 1 cup flour
• 1 1/2 cups milk
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vegetable oil
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

1. Combine flour, milk, eggs, and oil.
2. Add salt.
3. Heat a lightly greased 6 inch skillet; remove from heat.
4. Spoon in 2 Tbsp batter; lift and tilt skillet to spread evenly.
5. Return to heat; brown on one side only.
6. To remove, invert pan over paper toweling.
7. Repeat with remaining batter.
8. Fill with your favorite filling.

I made strawberry compote with 1 cup frozen strawberries, 2 Tbs. vanilla sugar and a teeny bit of water. P. decorated his with whipped cream, I went with just the strawberries and a little honey and they were absolutely wonderful.

Crock pot roast beef and... cupcakes? well, kind of...

The soup I made last night was amazing! As a matter of fact it was so good that I took the last of it and poured it over the roast that I had seasoned and was waiting to get tossed into the crock pot (which is by far my favorite kitchen gadget) Lemme just tell y'all that I left that thing to cook overnight (I don't like to leave the crock pot on when I'm not home, a fear instilled in me by my grandmother "You'll burn the whole house down!!!") Well.. it smelled so amazing that it woke me up in the middle of the night!

I took 1- 3 pound roast and seasoned it with salt and pepper and seared it in a hot pan just until it was browned on all sides (about 2-3 minutes per side), chopped up 3 cloves of garlic and roughly cut 4 carrots, those went into the bottom of my crock pot (that as always, was lined with a Reynolds Crock pot liner because I HATE doing dishes and the less cleaning up I have to do, the better) I put the seared roast on top of the carrots and garlic and poured the remainder of my French onion soup on top of the roast. Put the cover on, turned it on low and left it all night to cook (from about 9pm-6:30am) when I got up this morning i turned it off and took the crock out of the electric cooker to cool and into the fridge it went until P. got home and then he put it back in the cooker and turned it onto warm so by the time I got home from work I just had to make some rice and dinner was ready.. YUMMMMY!!

Now.. for the cupcake:


Oh come on.. I had to buy it! I was So hoping they had it in black.. but for $2.99 I wasn't going to be picky

French food doesn't have to be stuffy

Alright, so Most of it really is.. Foie gras (eew, in my book) Creme Brulee.. takes a lot of work (but so totally worth it, lol) French toast, one of my absolute favorite foods! But this, well. this is as far from stuffy as it gets, and the best, quickest, easiest French onion soup that I have ever made, and I've made quite a few (all that required hours of simmering on the stove or in the crock pot) I made this tonight when I got home after drooling over the recipe for a week I finally had all my ingredients together and was ready to just do it, the results (a damn shame I don't have a camera to show y'all how damn good this looked!) perfectly soft onions in a rich, dark broth perfect harmony in a bowl of soup topped with a cheesy crouton.. The best of the best in my book and done in under 30 minutes!

FRENCH ONION SOUP

"Thick slices of French bread are toasted in the oven and placed on top of each bowl of rich onion soup. Slices of Swiss cheese are melted over the toast."

INGREDIENTS:
1/4 cup butter
3 onions, thinly sliced
1 teaspoon white sugar
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
2 1/2 cups water
1/2 cup red wine
2 (10.5 ounce) cans condensed
beef broth
1 French baguette or thick bread
8 ounces sliced Swiss cheese

DIRECTIONS:
1.Melt butter or margarine in a 4 quart saucepan. Stir in sugar. Cook onions over medium heat for 10 minutes, or until golden brown.

2.Stir in flour until well blended with the onions and pan juices. Add water, wine, and beef broth; heat to boiling. Reduce heat to low. Cover soup, and simmer for 10 minutes.

3.Cut four 1 inch thick slices of bread from the loaf. Toast the bread slices at 325 degrees F (165 degrees C) just until browned, about 10 minutes. Reserve the remaining bread to serve with the soup.

4.Ladle soup into four 12 ounce, oven-safe bowls. Place 1 slice toasted bread on top of the soup in each bowl. Fold Swiss cheese slices, and fit onto toasted bread slices. Place soup bowls on a cookie sheet for easier handling.5.Bake at 425 degrees F (220 degrees C) for 10 minutes, or just until cheese is melted

Mac & cheese, MY ultimate comfort food

Today was one of those days that you kind of dread.. it s tarted off at 4am with "Mooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooom... I'm gonna be SICK!!" so when my alarm went off at 6:20 this morning I knew I was destined to stay at home with P who proceeded to 'be sick' until around 4:30 when he finally fell back to sleep. I watched some news, then called work to let them know I wasn't coming in and then climbed back into my own bed so I could get some sleep (since I didn't really go back to sleep after P. got sick) then my phone rang at 9:30, my office was calling because one of the computers wasn't working, when I asked what the problem was exactly the response from the other end was "it's got an error message" Oy Vey.. well.. since I can't see what's going on you're going to have to call the computer guy, here's the number (that I had to look up online because the person on the other end either didn't have it or was too lazy to look for it) and then I proceeded to go back to bed... when another knock came at my door at 11am.. it was my landlord.. with a guy from the local utility company, meters had to be moved, pipes were rotting outside.. blah blah blah.. so I had 2 guys going in and out of my apartment for a good part of the afternoon taking the utility meters out of the closet in my bedroom and moving them outside (which is awesome because now I can actually use that closet for something other than hiding Christmas and birthday presents and hopefully not have to worry about creepy spiders in there anymore.. I have horrible arachnophobia)
Since the Kid didn't really want to eat anything more than pastina with butter and I was planning on stopping at the supermarket after work today because there wasn't really much to work with in the fridge I had to make due with what I had.. even if it was a slightly bare form of my usually cheese packed mac & cheese.. some basic Bechamel with 2 cups of marbled cheddar cheese mixed with some cannelli spirals, topped with some bread crumbs and a few dabs of butter and tossed in the oven at 350°f for 10 minutes and I've got my comfort food, for a day that was less than comforting..
Here's to hoping tomorrow is better.. at least the kid hasn't gotten sick anymore today.

Whatever floats your boat.. Cheesecake Brownie Edition

If you haven't tried them yet.. What are you waiting for? Ok, ok.. I know almost everyone has their own Go-To recipe for brownies.. But if yours comes a box this recipe will make you a believer that from scratch is not only better, but it can be easy too.. I mean, this recipe is so simple, it's one bowl, pop it in the oven and you're good to go.. and this recipe can be doubled with no trouble at all! I've made this for bake sales ever since I came across it.. and so far the only thing that I mixed in that I didn't like was toffee bits, they gave a chewiness that I didn't really care for.

Today I was craving chocolate.. I was hoping to make a panna cotta, but the ramekins I have are quite small for the recipe I want to use.. I think I might just go and get some plastic cups and use those as 'molds'.. that's for another day though.. Tonight it was my much loved Whatever floats your boat brownies with some extra chocolate chips mixed in.. and a cheesecake twist.

The basic whatever floats your boat recipe is as follows:

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup butter, melted
• 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 eggs
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• 1/2 cup flour
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

WHATEVER FLOATS YOUR BOAT

• 1-2 cup chocolate chips (semisweet, white, butterscotch, peanut butter) or raisins or chopped maraschino cherry or chopped nuts or M&M' or Reese's pieces or miniature marshmallow

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
2. Grease an 8 inch square pan or line with foil.
3. In a medium bowl combine melted butter and cocoa and stir until cocoa is dissolved.
4. Add sugar and mix well.
5. Add eggs one at a time and stir until well combined.
6. Stir in vanilla, flour and salt until you no longer see any flour (do not overmix).
7. Fold in "WHATEVER FLOATS YOUR BOAT"!
8. Spread in pan and bake for approximately 25 minutes.

DO NOT OVER-BAKE -- your brownies will come out dry. Adjust time/temp accordingly for your oven. If you do the knife/toothpick test, it should come out with moist crumbs, not clean.

The cheesecake twist is this:

Cheesecake topping for Brownies

Ingredients:

• 1 egg
• 1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese, soft
• 1/3 cup granulated sugar

Directions

1. Combine three ingredients using a hand-mixer until soft and creamy.
2. Gently spoon over brownie or cake batter.
3. Swirl topping with a knife, cutting through the batter underneath.

They're in the oven as I write this and the smell is just almost too much to bear.. I can't wait to bite into one! (and nah nah to my fussy low fat, no fat sugar free eating co workers who don't get any)