Better than sex cake (Scandalous recipe!)

 Ingredients:  Devils Food Cake
(eggs, oil, water)
Sweetened Condensed Milk
Cool Whip
Large Symphony Bar with Toffee and Almonds


First off, don't tell your mother what the name of this cake is. She'll most likely embarrass you by making you tell your bishop what its called when he comes over for dinner when you're 13.
I'm guessing.





Bake the Devils food cake as directed. If you can't figure that out, you have no business making this cake.

When the Devils Food cake is done, take it out and let cool completely. Then take a candle (or pen lid) and poke holes all over the cake.

Take this beauty.......

....and pour it all over the cake. Try to get it inside the holes so it soaks through the cake. Sometimes I get an extra can of the sweetened condensed milk and use about half of it so the cake gets completely saturated in ooey gooey-ness. After its all spread over the cake, cover and put in the fridge for 4 hours or overnight.

Chop up your Symphony bar and stir it into the cool whip. I just use a regular sized tub of cool whip. Refrigerate for later.

This is the goodness that happens after overnight refrigeration. Ignore my ugly countertop.

Put a dallop of candy cool whip on top and enjoy!
I'll let you decide for yourself what this cake is better than ;)

Bacon, Leek and Tomato Spaghetti

Ingredients: 

1 lb thin Spaghetti, 

Extra Virgin Olive oil, 

3 Leeks,

6 slices bacon, 

minced garlic, 

3 cans Italian diced tomatoes 

(or whole tomatoes and just

smash them...you could pretend its

someone you don't like)

Basil, Parsley,

Parmesan Shavings

   Mad props to my guest photographer, (my 8 year old) Elaine! She loves taking pictures for me.....          she is a foodie photographer in the making.

Chop the root end off your leeks and peel off the outer layer. Slice the leeks down the middle, and then slice into small strips. Put leeks into a medium bowl and fill it with cold water and soak.

We really like bacon. It makes us happy. I know the recipe says 6 slices, but we do a whole package. Its about 12 slices. Center cut is the best bacon ever. It doesn't make too much grease, but just enough for this recipe.

Dice it up

Toss it into a large skillet with some evoo. Make it big. This recipe will fill up the whole thing. cook until bacon is a little crispy.









While the bacon is cooking, you'll want to separate the leeks layers. They are kinda like onions, but when they grow, they get dirt in between the layers. You want to kind of make a clothes washer agitator motion with your hand and get all that dirt out of them. I know, that sounds weird. Humor me.

When they're all pulled apart and clean, take a clean dish towel and lay it out on the counter. Pull the leeks out of the water with your hands (look at all the dirt in that water. Gross.) and spread them out over the towel. Lay another clean towel over the top and pat dry.

This is how you want your bacon/olive oil to look. Now you're not going to drain any grease. You want that bacon flavoring in the sauce. If you used Center cut, it won't be a lot anyway.


Ummm.....you may want to start your pasta water. I really hope you know how to cook pasta. Cook pasta to Al Dente.

Add a couple teaspoons minced garlic to your bacon. If you really like garlic (as I do) you can put more.


And more. 

A little more than that.

Okay. That's enough.
Oh yeah, now add the leeks to your bacon-y goodness. Simmer 3 minutes or so until the leeks are good and wilted.

Italian diced tomatoes.

These are tricky to find. The can may not say "Italian", it may just say, "Basil, Garlic & Oregano". Same thing. Buy it. Buy a bunch. You'll make this again. If you only find Italian Whole tomatoes, just mash them up in the pan.







Dump 3 cans of it into your skillet and mix it up.

Now add your perfectly cooked pasta. Take a food grabber thingy like mine, and go ahead and mix it in. Just like this. Keep doing it for about 3 minutes until the noodles are all saturated with the sauce.....

I didn't in this picture, but you can also throw in some basil leaves and mix them in (Wal-mart was out that day)
Cut up some fresh Parsley and sprinkle it over the top.

Add Parmesan shavings. I love Parm shavings. This is not the same with powdered Parmesan. Trust me. Shredded is not bad, but try to go for the shaved. It sounds dumb but it matters.


Enjoy! This serves quite a few people. My family of 5 eats a ton and we still have lots left for lunch the next day.


This recipe is adapted from Rachael Ray.

Orange Chicken

This recipe is really messy to make, but sooo good. I didn't want to risk getting my camera all gooey, so I'm just gonna give you the link to it on Annies Eats.
 
My 6 year old is a huge fan of Panda Express Orange Chicken, but she didn't like this. I see that as a good sign. She said it was too "orangey". Whatever. Its was amazing. Make it. Right now. Or tomorrow. Let me know what you think. Serve with rice.

Crockpot Chicken Tortilla Soup (EASY RECIPE)

 Okay, so admittedly there are no tortillas in this soup. But that is truly the name of it. Call it whatever the heck you feel like calling it.

Ingredients: 
3 frozen chicken breasts
2 (15 oz) cans of blackbeans, drained
2 (15 oz) cans of stewed tomatoes
1 cup medium salsa (I used Pace Picante, but I bet it  would be awesome with fresher stuff)
1 can corn, drained
1 can tomato sauce
I also rinsed the corn and beans to get a little less sodium in there. You won't miss it at all.


Throw everything into your crockpot and cook on low until chicken is done (recipe says 8 hours, but my crockpot cooks fast)
When chicken is done, scoop it out and shred it.
(Tip: Put it in a medium bowl and mix with a hand mixer. Its shredded perfect in literally 5 seconds)

 Put shredded chicken back in the crockpot for a half hour or so.

Serves.....a whole lotta people. I would guess 6 -7 adults.


Top with Tortilla (there they are) chips, cheese and sour cream.

"Healthy" Chocolate Chip Cookies......don't be frightened

A far cry from my normal fare, these are actually healthy. Or as healthy as a chocolate chip cookie can be. I admit, I have been off sugar for 2 weeks today (with one discrepancy on girls night out), so these may taste better to me because of that. Any-who, they are a great "clean eating" recipe for satisfying the sweet tooth. Just make them under supervision, they are still 110 calories apiece :)




Almond Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

1 cup Almond Butter
3/4 cup Sucanat  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sucanat
1 large egg
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp sea salt
3 oz DARK chocolate (70% cocoa or greater), broken into small pieces






Preheat oven to 350. In a medium bowl, stir first five ingredients until blended. Stir in chocolate.


Drop dough by rounded tablespoonfuls onto parchment paper-lined baking sheets. Bake for 10-12 minutes. Let cool on baking sheet for 5 minutes, then for 15 minutes on wire rack

Strawberry Pie

  This is one of those recipes that I hesitate to give out. I hate saying that because I think its dumb when people don't share recipes. I understand, but I still think its dumb. I believe that unless you created the recipe from scratch or it is a family recipe handed down from your great great aunt and she'd haunt you for eternity for sharing it, then you should spread the food happiness around. I only hesitate to give it out because I love taking this pie to share with people. I love getting the credit. I love being told how amazing and completely delicious it is, and asked, "Can I please have the recipe?" No....they can't. But you can.

So I am finally sharing it now because this is not in fact, my own recipe. I "stole" this one from the mother of an ex-boyfriend...of my sister. Like 15 years ago.
  Man I hope you guys like this, I've talked it up too much:)

Ingredients: 4 lbs Fresh Strawberries(I had 2 lbs and had to go buy more)
2 Deep Dish Pie Crusts (mine are store bought, feel free to make your         own if you feel like showing off)
1 Container of Strawberry Pie Glaze (sold by the strawberries, duh)
One 8 oz. Package Cream Cheese (Regular, NOT fat free)
1 Container Cool Whip
                                   About 1 1/2 Cups Powdered Sugar


                                                                        Bake crusts as directed.

Okay, this was my first attempt at making the filling in a long time. I used Fat Free cream cheese. Fat Free. Seriously, shoot me the next time I do that. Its fine if cream cheese isn't a main part of the dish, but in this case it is the whole enchilada.

Don't add enchiladas to this recipe.


This is how that one turned out. I guess it was fine, but if you look closely, you can see tiny little granules of cream cheese still visible. I hate that. It infuriates me. So I moved on, still fuming.

In a separate bowl, pour glaze over strawberries. Don't do the whole container. you're gonna want them all just coated, not swimming through a sea of glaze. Pour a little and mix.....repeat until you're happy with it. I used about 2/3 of it for 2 lbs berries.




                                 This is a good amount.

Okay, so I couldn't deal with the cream cheese thing, so I refrigerated everything and finished up today, with a new package of full fat cream cheese. Mix together the cream cheese, Cool Whip, and Powdered sugar. The sugar is up to you on the amounts. Its really how sweet you like it. I used 1 1/2 cups.

Beat the heck out of it for 1-2 minutes, and thats it. See how creamy? It was effortless.

 Here it is again......












Oh wait....

One more time, just look at the difference. Poopy grainy fat free cream cheese mixture on the left, smooth dreamy creamy mixture on the right.....the left one isn't really poopy.

Put a generous dallop (I like that word) of creamy goodness on your cooled cooked pie crust.

Spread it around. Make sure its a thick layer.

Remember these bad boys?







Sure you do.....
Pour 'em right on top.

     Yum.

  I couldn't wait. In fact, I was eating this as I wrote this post. I'll probably be eating more as you read it too. I seriously can't figure out why 2 hours of working out per day isn't helping....

Crock Pot Philly Cheese Steak Sandwiches

I love my crock pot. Just the fact that you can throw random ingredients in and then just at the turn of a knob you have this amazing meal (In 6-8 hours of course). Its genius. I wish I'd invented it. I did invent it actually. I'm famous. I'm surprised you didn't recognize me.

Oki doki...let's get started. Here's your ingredients list:  2 lbs London Broil
1 green or red bell pepper
1/2 yellow onion, sliced
1 beef bouillon cube
1/4 cup warm water
 2 Tbs Worcestershire Sauce
4 sub rolls
4 slices Provolone Cheese
(I actually got about 6-7 sandwiches out of this recipe, just depends how much in each)

Take your 1/4 cup warm water and dissolve your bouillon cube in it. (This actually didn't work for me, I ended up throwing 1/2 the cube away after it didn't dissolve....turned out fine) Set aside.

I love peppers. So pretty and yummy smelling.

Layer pepper and onion on the bottom of the crock pot.

Layer London Broil on top of vegetables.

Pour bouillon water over meat. Bouillon smells really gross. I'm sorry. It turns out good, I promise!

For some reason I feel really cool when I cook with this stuff. I don't know why. Drizzle 2 Tbs over meat













Don't look at me like that.

Cook on high for 4 hours. Honestly, it depends on your slow cooker. Mine took 3 hours. Its really like a microwave masquerading as a slow cooker. This is after 2 1/2-3 hours. I took my meat out and cut it up into small chunks, then put it back in to soak some juices.


 Now turn your broiler on and lightly toast those buns of yours!

After your buns are sufficiently toasted to your liking, load them up with your meat, onion, pepper mixture, and then layer cheese on top. Broil for a few more minutes-watch it close!!! You just want the cheese to melt.

Serve immediately!