Mini Caramel Apples

Everybody loves a caramel apple but nobody actually likes to eat them. They're a pain and you end up with caramel on your nose, plus the apple to caramel ratio is not good, far too much apple.

I've seen these floating around lately and I thought they were such a fun idea.

Mini Caramel Apples

I didn't take a picture tutorial because I only had one nap to complete them in, there wasn't time, also I didn' t know they'd be so cute. I will tell you what I did though.

I started with 3 apples, I meant to get more than that but I forgot to write it on my grocery list. Two were granny smith and one was a braeburn (can't wait until the Ambrosia's come back). I washed them well and then dried them. I then took a melon baller and made as many little scoops as I could. I think I got just under 30 so in the end 3 apples was plenty. I dropped those scoops in lemon water to keep them from going brown and then I dried them as well as I could.

Once they were dry I laid them out on a sheet of parchment paper (put a cookie sheet underneath, it was later that I realized how silly it was not to have). I didn't have any sucker sticks and I didn't want to buy any but I did have a small handful of bamboo skewers so I cut each one into 4 pieces and pressed those down into my apples (next time I'll probably use toothpicks).

It was here that I was grateful I'd read a few other people's experience with these apples and had formulated a good plan. I noticed as I pushed my sticks down that some apple juice would raise up and even trickle down the side sometimes. I had read that people have a hard time getting the caramel to stick to the apple since there's no skin, it just peels right off because there's no way to dry the apple well enough. I had decided to first dip in chocolate.

I melted a handful of chocolate chips in the microwave and once it was melted I decided it was much too thick. I thinned it with a little olive oil though I'm not sure why I didn't use milk, it was just the first thing that came to mind and it worked just fine.

Once my chocolate was a consistency I was happy with I dipped my apples in, one at a time. I used an extra skewer to help get the chocolate right up to the stick so there wasn't any apple showing. I did run out of chocolate halfway though and had to melt a little more. I replaced the dipped apples to my parchment and once they were done I slipped them into the fridge. Here's where I was wishing for a cookie sheet. I used some creative sliding with cutting boards and left them on that until the chocolate was set and I could replace the cutting boards with a cookie sheet.

While the chocolate set I got out my toppings (I should have done this while my caramel cooled). I used peanuts, teddy grahams and skor bits. The peanuts and teddy graham I crushed with a hammer. I put the three in small bowls and then I worked on the caramels.

I used a bag of Kraft caramels, unwrapped and microwaved with 2 tbsp of cream. Again I thought this was way too thick so I added probably another 4 tbsp, maybe even a little more than that.

It seemed like it was so thick it would just push off my chocolate.

At some point I realized my apples weren't setting fast enough so I transferred them to the freezer. I wanted them to be good and cold so my caramel wouldn't melt the chocolate so I only pulled out a couple at a time. The first two were casualties as the caramel was too hot and my chocolate melted. I gave it some time and then I resumed, I got better as I went on and here's what worked best.

I dipped one apple with my right hand and then tipped it upside down and transferred it to my left hand turning occasionally to give the caramel a little time to cool so it wouldn't all slide off. As I did that I dipped a second and transferred it to my left hand as well so I'm now holding and turning two apples. Then I dipped a third. While my third was being turned and cooled by my right hand I used my left to dunk the two in topping and then place on the parchment. By the time those two were done I could dunk the remaining one. I repeated that until I was finished (sounds tricky but it was really no big deal).

Start to finish they took about an hour and a half which I thought was not bad for such a delicious result.

I do think they were a little fragile, It seemed like if I left them out of the fridge the caramel would start to slide off the chocolate and it got really sticky. This could have been for a couple reasons. Maybe the oil in the chocolate was a bad idea, or maybe I used too much milk in my caramel. I think I'll give them one more try to see if I can improve them but even as is they were a big hit and just so cute.

Polynesian Satay (Meat on a Stick) - SAMM

This is a dish that we had with Brad's family as an appetizer and it was a huge hit.  It was so good that Brad and I made it again the next week and ate it for dinner.

Here's what you start with

Combine 3/4 cup Soy Sauce, 1/2 cup brown sugar, 2 Tbsp oil, 1 minced garlic and 1/2 tsp ground ginger.  Give it a good whisk and it looks like this.

Then you take your sirlion steak and you're going to slice it nice and thin.  The trick to this is to put it in the freezer for about an hour and a half, you want it to be not frozen solid but a little stiff, it helps you get some awesome thin slices.

Here's what mine looked like when I pulled it out of the freezer.

Then slice it against the grain.  The recipe says 3mm but I think you really want to get it as thin as you can.  I aimed for 3mm and they would have been nice if they were thinner.

Slice until you have this nice pile.

Then toss all your neat slices into your marinate and coat all the pieces.

The recipe says to marinade for at least 30 minutes, I gave it a good 3 hours.  Make sure you give your container a shake and a rotate occasionally so all your meat is coated.

Here's mine post marinade.

This next part is slightly time consuming but until now it's all been a snap.  You thread your meat accordian style onto bamboo skewers that you've soaked in water.

Here's where I parted from the recipe, it says to broil them but why broil when you can bbq?

We gave them about 2 minutes per side and until they were all yummy and the sugar had carmelized.

That's it.  Since this was dinner I served it with cesear salad and carrots and it was delish.  They were even just as good the next day.

Polynesian Satay
3/4 cup soy sauce
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tbsp cooking oil (I used olive)
1 minced garlic clove
1/2 tsp ground ginger
Thick sirloin, cut across grain into 1/8 (3mm) thick slices
Bamboo skewers

In a bowl with a tight fitting cover, mix soy sauce, sugar, oil, garlic and ginger powder. Add beef and allow to marinate for at least 1/2 hour.

Thread meat onto wooden skewers accordion fashion.
Broil on top rack for 2 min per side until medium rare.

Store covered in refrigerator.

To serve, pile on baking sheet. Heat in 400F oven for 5 – 10 minutes until hot.



Linking to Share a Meal Monday

Napa Cabbage Salad & Blondie Bars

Brad's Granny* makes this salad that I can never get enough of.  There will be an entire counter full of yummy foods and this is what I end of going back for seconds of.

She's been making it for some time and I've been loving it and I started to rave about it to all of his siblings.  Turns out they'd all been skipping it for other dishes but my constant gushing was enough to make them try it and now all of us girls love this salad.  We'd go to family dinner at Granny's just hoping she's make this salad.  Well it turns out Jolayne is the smart one of the bunch and she finally called Granny and got the recipe.  It would be a shame to not share it with you.

Keep in mind I was in a little bit of a hurry so there are less photos than usual.

Take a large Napa cabbage and chop into nice thin strips, like so

Then you're going to add a large red pepper, diced nice and small and a bunch of green onions, also chopped up (chop them on an angle, they'll look so much better).  The recipe calls for two bunches but that really seemed like a lot to me so I only used one.  Give everything a toss and you have this.

Next to a saucepan add 1/4 cup butter (the recipe calls for margarine but I prefer to use butter), 1 cup slivered almonds and 1 pkg raman noodles, crunched up.

You're going to cook this on a warm heat, not hot because you don't want to burn your butter.  The goal is to make everything nice and toasty, doesn't this look yummy?

 When it's browned pour it over your cabbage mix and give it a toss.

Now it's time to combine your sauce.  The recipe gives the ingredients and then says to use half on the salad and save the other half for another day, that seemed silly to me so instead I cut the recipe in half and used all of it.

Combine the seasoning from the noodles, 1/2 cup olive oil, 1/4 cup red wine vinegar, 1 minced garlic clove, 1 tsp soy sauce and half of 1/3 of a cup of sugar (I couldn't be bothered to convert that into something easier to measure, I just eyeballed it).  Put all these in some sort of jar and give it a good shake.  Toss onto your salad, mix really well and let sit at least half an hour before you serve.

I took this to a ward potluck dinner where there were lots of people in attendance.  Everyone was asked to bring a salad and a dessert so you can imagine there was tons of food.  At the end of the evening I went to retrieve my bowl, there were lots of bowls half full of remaining salad yet mine was completely gone, and this makes a lot of salad.  It's that good.


While I was busy making the salad Brad worked on our Dessert.

 

Ages ago I'd grabbed this recipe for Blondie Bars from Cookie and Cups.  I had yet to make them but this was the perfect excuse.   I won't go into details because her blog is awesome except to say that when they came out of the oven they looked like this.  Lovely except do you see how we're running over the side?  Apparently my baking sheet didn't have a large enough rim.  Next time I'll bake some of the batter in a small dish to prevent this from happening again.  I think it would also help them cook just a little more evenly.

These were awesome bars that we'll definitely make again.  They were also a big hit and while many people took dessert home these were all gone.  Lucky for us the entire pan wouldn't fit in my container so we have some left to snack on today.


Napa Cabbage Salad

Salad Ingredients:
1 large Napa Cabbage
1 large Red Pepper
2 bunches Green Onion (I used 1 instead)

¼ cup Margarine (I used butter)
1 cup Slivered Almonds
1 pkg Raman Noodles, with seasoning

Dressing Ingredients: (I cut all of these in half)
1 cup Vegetable Oil (I used Olive oil)
½ cup Red Wine Vinegar
2 Garlic Cloves, minced
2 tsp Soy Sauce
1/3 cup Splenda (or Sugar)

Directions:

Slice cabbage very thinly.  Chop pepper and onions into small pieces.  Place vegetables in a large bowl

Crush noodles.  Melt margarine in a warm (not hot) skillet.  Add noodles and almonds and sauté ‘til toasted – stirring constantly. Be careful not to burn.  Add noodles and almonds to vegetables.

In a bottle with a lid, combine the dressing ingredients.  Shake to mix.

Pour ½ of dressing (or less) over salad at least 30 minutes before serving.  Refrigerate remaining dressing for another batch (or for use on another salad).


Go here for the Blondie Bar recipe


*I've decided I want to be a Granny.  Granny's are cool, they make the best buns, they sew, they make cookies.  I've decided I'll be a Granny, not a Grandma.

Cookie Salad

Have you made Kebob Salad yet?  Wasn't it yummy?  Now you know that I only give you my best recipies so here's the next.  I had this recipe last night and it knocked me upside the head it was so good.  I've thought of almost nothing else since, so under the guise of playing games we invited people over tonight so I could have an excuse to share this with you.

That's right, Cookie Salad.  It's a salad, it's good for you right?

I'll be the first to admit that this isn't the most beautiful dish but taste far outweighs looks in this one, trust me.  And let's be honest, there's not much in it that's good for you but just go with it, be in the moment and enjoy.


Here we go...

The recipe calls for a tub of Cool Whip but I'm not super fond of it so I replaced it with real cream.  If you're going to substitute like me then here's where you whip your cream.  I sweetened it too, Cool Whip is sweet so I added a little sugar and vanilla.

While your cream is whipping open a package of chocolate drizzled shortbread cookies.  I'm sure you've seen them, they're easy to find and apparently you can get them at the dollar store (I got mine at Safeway).  Empty your package into a ziplock bag (or if you used the last one on something else today a bread bag works too).  Give them a good smash with a rolling pin but not too much, you want some good cookie chunks.

I had a brilliant idea... you know how when you crush stuff with chocolate lots of it gets stuck to the bag?  I decided to throw my cookies in the freezer first to harden the chocolate.  Sadly I didn't have this brilliant idea until it was time to smash so give it a try if you make these, it might work.

While your cream is still whipping (or while it sits in the bowl if it's done already), mix your buttermilk and pudding and whisk real good so there aren't any lumps.

To your pudding mix add everything else.  I tossed in my cream, then my cookies (heh, heh, I tossed my cookies) and then some berries.  Give it a good mix and you're done.

I used blackberries and raspberries but you could use whatever you want.  I didn't use a ton of them either about half of each package.  After I'd tossed them in I wished I'd cut up my blackberries a bit since they're so big but it was too late so even though the recipe said to fold in the whipped cream which usually means be gentle, I did more of a chopping action with my spatula trying to smash the blackberries a bit.  There's no messing this up.

Let it all mingle together in the fridge for a bit and you end up with something far yummier than I had anticipated.  In fact when I first dished myself I took quite a small bowl, I expected mushy cookies but I was very wrong.  Take a large bowl, you won't regret it.  It's also delicious a day later, and for breakfast.

Cookie Salad
2 cups buttermilk
1 package vanilla pudding
1 large tub Cool Whip (or 1 cup whipping cream, sweetened and whipped stiff)
1 package chocolate drizzled shortbread cookies, smashed into bits
1 cup (ish) Fruit of your choice

Whisk buttermilk and pudding mix.  Fold in Cool Whip, cookies and berries.  Refrigerate and serve.

Kebob Salad

Brad and I have decided that our house is the hottest place on earth.  Never have I lived in a house that got more hot or cooled down more slowly.  I realize this is a bit dramatic but every day we sit and sweat in our little house with no basement to retreat to.  The heat, combined with Brad being home a lot lately has led to me not wanting to be anywhere near the stove.  All of this led us to Kebob Salad.  I'm sure it's not unique, others have probably been doing it for years but it was our first time and it was a success so I'll share.

 Start with some chicken (I only used one of the three breasts) and cut it in to nice chunky cubes.

 Toss it in a ziplock bag with a good squeeze of caesar dressing and squish it up until it looks like the below.

Then throw it in the fridge for a while (a couple hours is best).

As it gets closer to dinner time get your veggies ready. 

We used a red pepper, half a green pepper, a chunk of red onion and you can see a bowl of frozen shrimp there too, I happened to have it in the freezer.  Let the shrimp defrost and cut everything else into chunks (not too small because you have to kebob them all, you'll be hating yourself later if they're too small).  I used lots of red onion this time because we decided it was our favorite part of the last salad.

Get them all on your skewers.  I used a combination of metal ones and wooden ones, soaking the wooden ones for a few minutes before I skewered.  A word about skewering your chicken.  We marinated in a creamy dressing so this is not going to be a clean job.  Just be in the moment and go for it, you can always wash after.

Give the veggies and shrimp a drizzle of olive oil and send your hubby out to the BBQ (I don't BBQ, that's a blue job).


While he's cooking wash and dry your lettuce (I use a salad spinner Brad gave me).

Here's what your skewers look like when they're ready to come off, all yummy and slightly charred.

One great thing about this salad... since you're going to take all the food off the skewers to serve you don't have to make them pretty, you can put all the onion on one stick, all the chicken on another and so on.  This means that you don't need to worry about the food cooking at different times, when the chicken is ready you can take it off and give the veggies more time if they need it.  Small hint, peppers always take longer to cook than you think they will.

Once everything is cooked and still hot slide them all of the sticks and onto your lettuce.

I'm pretty sure this next part is what makes the salad so yummy.  I used a squeeze of creamy poppyseed dressing on it all, it adds such a nice sweetness.  Make sure you don't use too much though, this stuff is strong so a little goes a long way.

See how you can barely see any dressing in the picture?  It's enough, really.

Here's one more picture of the salad all mixed and ready to eat.  Such a great dinner and since you use so little dressing it's great for you.  The caesar dressing really keeps the chicken moist and the two dressings work well together.  You can add any veggies you want, these are just the ones we love.

It's a perfect summer dinner so give it a shot!


Kebob Salad
1 Chicken Breast
1 Red Pepper
1/2 Green pepper
1/2 Red Onion
Handful of Shrimp
Caesar Dressing
Poppy seed Dressing
Head of Green Leaf Lettuce

Golden Graham Smores

I don't post recipes very often never mind recipes with step by step instructions but that's what you're getting today.

A conversation about Rice Krispy Treats brought back memories of the yummy Golden Graham version so when I needed a treat for a gathering on Monday night I took the opportunity to make some.


Golden Graham Smores
3/4 cup corn syrup
3 tbsp butter
1 pkg chocolate chips
3 cups miniature marshmallows
1 tsp vanilla
1 pkg (12 oz) Golden Graham cereal

1. Grease 9x13 pan

2. Heat syrup, butter and chocolate chips to boiling, stirring constantly.

Confession, I'm pretty sure I didn't heat to boiling.  I melted it all together called it good.

3. Add marshmallows and stir until mostly melted.  Remove from heat and stir in vanilla.

I thought it would be nice to have some marshmallow pieces so I stirred until it looked like this and then dumped in my cereal.  I'm not sure you actually notice any pieces in the final product but it didn't hurt.

Second confession.  As I was pressing them into the pan I looked up and noticed my bottle of vanilla sitting on the counter, that's right, I forgot to add it.  Oops.

4. Add cereal, stir to coat and using a greased spoon press into pan.  Let cool.

Not the prettiest dessert but so yummy!  Even better than I remembered and they were a big hit.  Be prepared, they are real sweet.