What's cooking at Jerk Castle . . .

Lemon Blueberry Cheesecake Bars

With Valentine's Day being a Sunday this year, there was a lot of playful back and forth in my house as to who is going to make who what meal. . . we ultimately agreed that Steven will make breakfast (omelette's and breakfast sausage),  we will cook dinner together (roast chicken, oven-baked sweet potato fries and broccoli) and I will make these cheesecake bars for dessert.  

We had seen Tyler Florence make these bars on his ultimate chicken salad episode (which by the way we made with the leftover roast chicken and was fabulous). . these bars seemed pretty easy for someone that is not really into baking. . .but impressive enough for a valentine's day present. . .

they came through- sweet and creamy with a mild lemon flavor and a tasty gingerbread crust.

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/tyler-florence/lemon-blueberry-cheesecake-bars-recipe/index.html

Tips: 1)  don't skip the step of baking the crust before making the rest as that firmed up the crust and gave it a little crisp.
2)  the recipe calls for refrigerating the bars for three hours before cutting them - we waited only about an hour and a half, and that was fine.
3)  run the knife under hot water before every few cuts when slicing the bars to keep the cheesecake from sticking (this tip was on the show, but not noted in the recipe) 

  

I know you want one. . .  

Apple-Cranberry Crisp

We host thanksgiving each year. . . hard to believe, but this was year four. I will put up a series of posts with what we served this year, the good, the bad and tips to how to make it better. The highlights were the potato leek soup and the crisp for dessert. . . (the turkey was good and juicy too, don't get me wrong, but its more fun to talk about the sides)

The last three years we made a carmelized pumpkin and pear crumble for dessert using a recipe I had found years ago in Real Simple magazine. I love that dessert, but it doesn't quite get the attention i think it deserves from our guests. . .  so this year we decided to try a different crisp (i love a good crisp).

I chose this Apple-Cranberry Crisp figuring that apple and cranberry were a classic  pairing for Fall. . . it was a total hit- a perfect combination of sour and sweet and really easy to make. You are basically just mixing everything and then baking- no cooking anything first on the stove.

apple-cranberry crisp recipe from Bon Appetit

serves 6

11/2 pds tart green apples, peeled, cored cut into 3/4 inch pieces

3 cups fresh or frozen cranberries

2/3 cup sugar

4 tbls all-purpose flour, divided

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1 tsp ground nutmeg

3/4 cup old-fashioned rolled oats

2 tbls firmly packed golden brown sugar

2 tbls butter, cut into poeces, room temparature

*preheat oven to 375 degrees

*toss apples, cranberries, 2/3 cup sugar, 2 tbs flour, cinnamon and nutmeg to blend in large bowl

*transfer to 8x8x2 inch glass baking dish- let stand for 15 minutes

*combine oats, brown sugar and remaining 2 tbls flour in medium bowl- add butter and stir until moist clumps form, sprinkle topping over filling

*bake until topping is golden brown and filling bubbles- app. 1 hr- serve warm or at room temperature

tips-

1. we made this the night before and then re-heated it in the oven as dinner was finishing- worked out just fine.

2. double the crisp recipe for extra crisp- the portion called for in the recipe just did not seem like enough. . .and why hold back on dessert?

3. make your own whip cream- its easy, wonderful tasting and a nice touch to have your guests scoop homeade whip cream onto their crisp. . . just add cream and sugar and wisk- we used 1 pint heavy cream (for ten people), 2 to 3 tbls sugar (to taste), and the wisk attachment to an immersion blender. . a hand blender works as well of course and if you must, good old fashioned wisking by hand would work as well (but takes a lot longer).

4.  we used fresh cranberries and a differently sized glass dish and it worked out great.

I love beignets

We had a wonderful and very fattening meal last night - one of those meals where you wake up in the morning thinking about the salad you should have for lunch.  We went out with my brother in law and sister in law to see jazz at the Jazz Standard and thus I was forced to eat almost a full rack of BBQ ribs. . they were delicious.

Too bad I couldn't leave it at that. . . I decided when we got home that we needed to make some beignets for dessert and happened to have dough defrosted in the fridge (seriously, who has already made beignet dough in the fridge? I am an addict but beignets are one of those desserts that make me feel that life is really good and not to worry about work. . . a few minutes of escape that is well worth it).

For those of you who want to indulge in fried sweet dough and experience the same moments of bliss, here is the recipe we used:

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/emeril-lagasse/sweet-beignets-recipe/index.html

Tips: only fry a few at a time so that the temperature of the oil doesn't dip-also the thickness of the beignet can change the flavor so play around with it a bit until you find the right thickness. And freezing the extra dough and then defrosting it, worked perfectly.

A few pics of the process and the results. . .

 

 

I will be thinking about them as I eat my spinach salad for lunch. . .