West African Peanut Sauce

I was intrigued by this recipe for West African Peanut Soup and decided to make it but with a twist. One of the comments on the recipe said this was typically served in Africa on a bed of rice with chicken instead of all mixed up in a hearty soup. This sounded intriguing so I thought I'd give it a whirl.....

Ahhhh, a common image on the foodiestudent blog. Hello onion. I peeled you, cut you into manageable pieces, and sliced you in the food processor. Now I'm sauteeing you.

After adding some red and green peppers we end up with something I like to call "Christmas in a pot".

I added diced tomatoes, chicken broth, and some spices. That simmered for a while before I added the key ingredient....

Peanut Butter! Say what? Peanut Butter! Oh yeah.

I was skeptical... peanut butter with veggies in a sauce? Let's see what happens....

I whisked in the peanut butter to get it blended in. The peanut butter gave the sauce a richness and texture.

Some wild rice, a salad, and some peanuts for garnish completes the meal.

Honestly, the first bite or two I didn't know what to think. I had never tasted those flavors in combination before. But then I got into it and dove in with gusto. It turned out to be a great meal.

There is one thing I would change... I'd cut back on the chicken stock just a little as it made the sauce too thin. This is to be expected as the recipe was originally a soup recipe. However, the end result was far too thick to be considered a typical soup.

As served above, this is a vegetarian recipe (if desired, vegetable stock could be substituted for chicken stock in the recipe). I served leftovers the following day with chicken which was also a big hit. This will definitely be made again in the foodiestudent kitchen.

Caramel Apple Sticky Buns

I defy anyone to take a look at this recipe for Caramel Apple Sticky Buns and not start drooling. Even though I don't really like apples, a little voice told me I had to make them or I would forever regret it. Always listen to those little voices.

Diced apples with a sprinkling of lemon juice cus, you know... brown bits are yucky.

Remember this bread/cinnamon roll dough? Well, now is the time to use it. Don't worry, although the blog posts are like a week apart, the making of the sticky buns only happened the day after the cinnamon rolls. The dough will keep in the fridge for up to 2 days so I was within the safety zone.

The caramel sticky sauce starts by melting some butter in a saucepan.

Then I added some brown sugar, white corn syrup (instead of dark), and milk (instead of cream). Trust me, the substitutions made no difference in the final product.

When the caramel sauce starts to boil set it aside to cool.

I won't go over the step by step process of rolling out the dough and making the cinnamon rolls as they are the same for this recipe as for the other cinnamon rolls.

Divide the caramel sticky sauce into two well greased 9 or 10 inch round cake pans.

Top with the diced apples.

Place the cut cinnamon rolls in the pans on top of the apples. Let them rise for about half an hour and then bake.

Ahhhh, baked yumminess :)

Flip the bunch of them over onto a plate and watch the ooey gooey goodness overflow. I covered these with plastic wrap and took them into the office. I was worried that with so many sticky buns I'd be taking some home at the end of the day. However, I went to check on them at lunch time and they were all gone. They were, most definitely, a huge hit.

Lessons learned were exactly one..... that is to divide the rolls into three pans, not two. Two pans were just too full and caramel sauce overflowed during the baking process which resulted in the following.....

Burning and smokiness. Didn't affect the buns but made the kitchen smoky-stinky.

Would I make these again? TOTALLY AND COMPLETELY YES! I only had one but it was very yummy and, judging by the speed by which the others were claimed, the others were yummy too.

Shintangle Bed & Breakfast

This post will be a departure for me as I'm not featuring food that I made myself. Instead, all food featured in this post was made and consumed here....

My dear husband and I recently spent a weekend at this bed and breakfast. Our wonderful hostess (with the mostest), Heather, made us delightful breakfasts on each of the 3 mornings we were there.

Each morning we were greeted with the following...


There's orange and apple juice. We had the choice of coffee (medium or strong) or tea (various flavours) with cream and sugar but there was also milk and sweetener if those were our preferences. That little dish in front contains a curl of butter.

Every breakfast starts with this wonderful fruit plate. The quality of fruit here is outstanding... nothing is under or overripe. I'm not a big fruit eater but I cleared by plate every day.

Day 1: Pancakes, ham, hash brown potatoes, and scrambled eggs. As you can see, there are no eggs on the plate in the picture above. That's because Heather, the aforementioned "hostess with the mostest", knows I don't like eggs so she gave my portion to Vince. Vince did not complain :)

My syrup of choice that day was saskatoon berry syrup. Heather puts out three choices of syrup (see pic below). On the left is Canadian Maple, center is saskatoon berry, and on the right is butter maple. Oh yeah, and they're WARM! Talk about spoiling us!

Day 2: Waffles, bacon, syrups and.... get this.... maple flavoured creme fraiche! Is there anything yummier? I tasted it and determined that no, there is nothing yummier than maple flavoured creme fraiche. On this day I opted for butter maple on one of my waffles and saskatoon berry on the others. And creme fraiche was on all of them ;)

Day 3: Texas french toast with bacon and mandarin oranges. Once again, everything was cooked to perfection.

I was drinking my juice on the final day and, much to the confusion of those dining around me, I started laughing. That's because I saw this....

Anyone who watches LOST will recognize the Dharma Initiative logo on the bottom of my glass :)

Thanks Heather! You're the best!

If you are interested in spending the night at Shintangle B&B you can get more information at shintanglespring.com

Baked Beans - messing with the canned stuff

Beans have always been a heat and serve proposition in my life. I never realized there were possibilities beyond that. So something funny happened to my insides when I saw this baked bean recipe on PW's website. Beans, veggies, bacon... all good for the foodiestudent.

So what have I got to lose?

Green peppers and onions. These were done in the food processor. The food processor slices but it does not dice. So inspite of the recipe specifically calling for diced peppers and onions.... too bad! I've been in the kitchen cooking and baking all day and I'm taking the easy route.

Bacon is a rarity in my house. It's not that I don't love the taste... cus I do. It's not that I'm concerned about the sodium and nitrates... cus I'm not. It's because I don't like the bacon grease film that coats the stove top, counter, and me after I cook it.

But the recipe calls for bacon and I suffer for my art ;)

This bacon is WAY undercooked. But the recipe said to way undercook it. I'm obedient :)

I drained off a little of the bacon grease and added the sliced onion and green pepper.

Fast forward 5 minutes and they are nicely sauteed. Time to add the key ingredient.....

... BEANS!!!! These are Heinz, straight from the can. I added the remaining ingredients... barbeque sauce, dijon mustard, brown sugar, and cider vinegar. After a minute or two it started to simmer which was my cue to pour the mix into a greased casserole dish. Then it was topped with the undercooked bacon and baked at 325 for 2 hours.

Yup, 2 hours. This baked for a looooooooong time. When all was said and done, it was very yummy. A little sweeter than expected (with BBQ sauce and sugar, I should have guessed) and the sauce was very thick as much of the liquid had evaporated. The peppers and onion are a minor component to the dish and you can't even taste them. The bacon on top was absolutely perfect though. Definitely cooked but not burned.

Overall, I'm glad I tried it. But given the 2 hour cooking time I'm not sure I'd make it again. Who has that kind of time for a side dish except at Christmas? So unless someone requests beans with their turkey this year, this recipe will be passed by many many times.

Cream Cheese Frosting

Weeza has requested my recipe for cream cheese frosting. I got this recipe when I first made Pioneer Woman's cinnamon rolls but wanted a more Cinnabon-like frosting. So I did what every good foodiestudent would do... I googled Cinnabon frosting :)

Here are the ingredients. Icing sugar, margarine, cream cheese, vanilla, and lemon juice. I was only making 1/2 the recipe so I used just 1/2 a bag of icing sugar and a cup each of margarine and cream cheese.

Very important step.... wait for the margarine and cream cheese get to room temperature. I have tried mixing them right out of the fridge and now I'm in therapy.

The recipe I found was absolutely adamant that margarine, not butter, be used in this recipe. I didn't fully understand why but there was no doubt that in this case butter was to be avoided and margarine embraced. However, I have seen similar recipes that call for butter instead of margarine. So who are we supposed to believe? That's a question for another day. Today we are using margarine.

See how nicely the cream cheese and margarine mix together? That's because they are room temperature. :)

It's time to add the icing sugar. Please learn this lesson from foodiestudent.... turn the mixer down to low. The lowest possible setting. Add the icing sugar to the bowl one spoonful at a time. It will mix together quickly but won't explode out of the bowl in an icing sugar snowstom which is what will happen if the mixer is on a higher speed. This I have learned. Use a spatula to scrape down the sides when needed.

When the icing sugar has all been added turn the mixer on medium or medium-high and let it do its thing for 12 minutes. This will make the frosting super smooth and......

...strangely, it's a lighter colour. The frosting is much whiter now. Weird!

Once again, learn a lesson from foodiestudent, when the 12 minutes of high speed mixing are done, turn the mixer down to low. Add 1 teaspoon of vanilla and lemon juice and barely mix until they have incorporated into the frosting. If you overmix or mix at a higher speed the frosting becomes curdled. And curdled is bad.

Grab the two cinnamon buns closest to you and top with a dollop or two of the frosting. Enjoy :)

Cinnamon Rolls - Pioneer Woman's recipe

My cinnamon roll recipe has been a hit since the first time I made them. I give all respect and acknowledgement to Pioneer Woman. Her recipe (with fabulous photo instructions, as she always provides) can be found here.

Pioneer Woman uses a maple frosting to cover her rolls. I'm not a fan of maple flavor so I use a different frosting which I will demonstrate in a future post.

But for now, let's go through the steps of making cinnamon rolls.....

The dough is the same recipe as for white bread dough. So if you want to make this recipe and use half for bread buns and half for cinnamon buns, well, that would be smart. I've done that a few times :)

Start by scalding milk, sugar, and oil.

When the mixture has been scalded and then cooled for an hour or so add some yeast and flour. I use white bread flour but all-purpose will work. Mix them all together and let the mixture sit for an hour. It will rise a bit so make sure it is in a large enough bowl to allow for expansion.

After the mixture has risen add in another cup of flour, some salt, baking soda, and baking powder. Kneading isn't really necessary but will help incorporate the ingredients together when the mixture gets stiff. This picture shows HALF of the final dough mixture.

And I wanted to accommodate Weeza's request of showing an additional item in the pictures to give an idea of scale. Philly cream cheese packages are a fairly recognizable size and shape so I hope this works for you :)

Roll the dough out into a rectangle. This looks less like a rectangle than a Weeble that wobbles but has fallen down on its side. But the intention is to make a rectangle. Good luck with yours :)

The recipe calls for about a cup of melted butter but I find that to be too messy and too rich... 2/3 of a cup is plenty. Drizzle the melted butter all over the dough except for the front inch or so. Then sprinkle a cup of sugar all over and a generous sprinkling of cinnamon. I don't measure the cinnamon... just sprinkle until I think it's good enough :) Again, avoid the front inch of the dough.

Pioneer Woman doesn't add nuts or raisins here and neither do I. But if you had a nut or raisin deficiency that needed to be addressed in your diet then now would be the time to take care of that.

And.... we're rolling! Start at the end farthest from you and tightly roll the dough towards you. You'll thank me when you get to the end and you pinch to seal the front end of the dough to the roll. Keeping that final strip of dough free of butter and sugar makes it easier to seal dough to dough. Sealing dough to buttery dough is significantly harder.

I tried to get the whole roll in this shot but couldn't quite manage it. Anyways, the sealed roll is longer than the length of the rolled out dough from a few pictures above. That's because once it's all rolled up you will probably notice some thicker and thinner parts. It's best to even those out by lifting and gently stretching the thicker sections. The end result produces a longer roll than you started out with. Make sure you have the counter space to do this.

With a sharp knife, slice the rolls about 1 inch thick. For 1/2 the dough you'll have enough rolls to fill three 10" round cake or pie pans.

Let the pans sit for about 30 minutes to rise and then bake for 15-18 minutes in a 375 degree oven.

Here they are, all baked and yummy. The two pans on the right are 10", regular, Wilton brand cake pans. The rolls in those pans were fully cooked in about 15 minutes. The ones in the disposable pan on the left needed another 3 or 4 minutes to brown. Interesting! I learned a foodiestudent lesson when I didn't even do an official experiment :)

I took 2 cinnamon buns because they were the smallest of the bunch. Don't judge me! :)

A little yummy frosting on top and these were consumed with much haste.

Thank-you, Pioneer Woman, for this recipe. I love it and have had this recipe requested many times. Now that I have made a batch I will try not to make them again until Christmas. Or at least Thanksgiving. Okay, maybe Labor Day. Wait, that's in a few days. Yup, I can definitely wait until Labor Day :)

Oh, and what happened to the other half of the dough?

It continued to grow and prosper in its own way. Stay tuned for the adventures of the rest of the dough......

Candied Pecans

A few years ago I ordered a salad in a restaurant. I don't remember which restaurant. I don't remember what kind of salad. But on that salad was something that I have never been able to forget... candied pecans. They were not only the highlight of the salad but they were the highlight of every salad I've ever had! They were THAT amazing :)

I've tried to duplicate that experience by making my own candied pecans. I've tried a couple of recipes and as soon as I found this one I stopped looking. They are so good I have often eaten them by the handful. Just warning you... :)

Let's begin......

The ingredients are simple. Salt, pepper, cayenne, sugar, corn syrup, and pecans.

First we place some plain old regular white sugar in a bowl. I made triple the recipe so normally you wouldn't need a bowl quite this big. Sorry Weeza, I forgot my ruler.

Then I added some white corn syrup. Hey, I was kind enough to leave the bottle in this picture so that'll give you some idea of the size of the bowl.

Then the kick... salt, black pepper, and cayenne pepper. If you don't like a kick then omit the cayenne. But I like kick so..... cayenne-orama :)

Mix it all together until it looks really greyish and disgusting. Give it a tiny taste just to make sure you haven't gone too far into pepper-land. Adjust the sugar-salt-pepper ratio accordingly.

Then mix in the nuts. Gently stir them for a minute or so to ensure they are evenly coated with the mixture.

And spread the nut mixture out on a foil lined cookie sheet. I normally use just pecans but this time I decided to use half pecans and half almonds. Do I live on the edge or what?

This was triple the recipe. I have made quadruple the recipe before but with that many nuts you will need to use two cookie sheets. The nuts should be a single layer only.

After baking for about 15 minutes the nuts came out of the oven and I spread them out on aluminum foil. The candy glaze on the nuts will harden very quickly so make sure you spread the nuts out using two forks.

When they have cooled to room temperature these nuts will keep in an airtight container for a week or so.

For the original recipe check it out on Smitten Kitchen's site... Sweet & Spicy Candied Pecans. There are some cool salad tips there too.