Raspberry Cheesecake Loaf

I picked up some fresh raspberries from Costco and also had a 8oz block of cream cheese so I figured I would put them to good use. I did eat some of the raspberries fresh yesterday and at least I was a little good. The loaf is cooling right now, I cannot wait to see how it turns out. 

My son is eating my Cranberry lemon loaf I made for church tonight so I might have to go hide it.

Hope you give this a try and come back and let me know what you think.

2 cups flour
1 1/2 t baking powder
1/2 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
zest of three large lemons
Small container of fresh raspberries
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1/2 c room temperature butter
1 cup sugar
1 egg
Juice of the three large lemons and then enough milk to make 3/4 cup

8 oz Cream cheese
1 egg
1 t vanilla
1 cup powder sugar

Mix cream cheese until smooth, add in egg, vanilla and powder sugar and mix until smooth, set a side.

Preheat oven to 350. Spray a loaf pan and set aside.
Mix milk and lemon juice together and set aside.
Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir in lemon zest, and nuts, set aside.
Cream, butter, sugar, and egg together until smooth. Mix in lemon/milk mixture .Stir in four mixture just until moistened. Gently stir in Raspberries. Pour 3/4 batter into prepared pan, take a spoon and make a long hollow indent/ canal in the center of the loaf, I added my cream cheese mixture into a pastry bag, you can use a Ziploc bag or spoon, fill canal with a really good amount of cream cheese (depends on how much you like) take the remaining batter and evenly put along loaf, use a spoon or offset spatula and smooth around sides, when it bakes it will cover the cream cheese.
Bake for 1 hour or until skewer inserted away from the cream cheese mixture comes out clean. Let sit in pan for about 20 minutes, then turn onto wire rack to cool. It is very important this cools completely otherwise the cream cheese will ooze out.
This loaf was just something I made up at the last minute, will let you know how it turns out.

Update,
The flavor is really good and moist, I think it is because the cream cheese got adsorbed from the loaf batter. Once it cools completely I will take a picture of the middle of the loaf. I have been using my cell phone and not my camera because I am too lazy to get my camera out. 😊

Orange Cranberry Loaf Bread

I started Keto up again for health reason so I told myself I would not buy any more flour or sugar, well really it was butter or sugar when I ran out but I need butter for Keto. Well as you can see that did not last long, I don't care what anyone says, I have not tasted a good Keto bread or dessert recipe yet. If you have one post it below and I will give it a try. I just don't like the taste of fake sugar in desserts.  I only drink Sweet and low in my ice tea but hot tea has to have sugar.  For those  of you who know me know I am weird. 😀
So anyhow, back to my loaf bread. I seem to be on a loaf bread kick right now. I bought some fresh cranberries and wanted to do something different besides my Cranberry bar recipe. http://aprilshomecooking.blogspot.com/2008/11/cranberry-bars.html (These are really good)
 So I decided on a range Cranberry Loaf. I will admit the cranberries are a little tart for me so next time I think I will chop them a little before adding them to the flour, I just wanted those whole cranberries in the loaf so it would look pretty. 
Give it a try and let me know what you think.

2 cups flour
1 1/2 t baking powder
1/2 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
zest of two large oranges
1 1/2 cups cranberries
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1/4 c room temperature butter
1 cup sugar
1 egg
3/4 cup orange juice (juice of the two large oranges)

Preheat oven to 350. Spray a loaf pan and set aside.
Whisk together our, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir in orange zest, cranberries and nuts, set aside.
Cream, butter, sugar, and egg together until smooth. Mix in Orange juice.Stir in four mixture just until moistened. Pour batter into prepared pan.
Bake for 1 hour or until skewer inserted in center comes out clean. Let sit in pan for about 15 minutes, then turn onto wire rack to cool.

Banana Bread

I love banana bread, I am always on the look out for new recipes to try out. Today I made three different loaf breads and I wish I could say I followed them to the T but for some reason I have a hard time not adding my own twist to it.
This loaf baking happened because I went to IKEA and found some thinner loaf pans so I had to use them, now I need to go back and pick up some more. The ones I have are too wide and they make my loafs look too wide.

Check out http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/banana_Bread/ for this yummy recipe.
I was good and only added two small ingredients to it.

2-3 very ripe bananas, peeled
1/3 cup melted butter
1 tea baking soda
1 tea cinnamon
1/2 tea nutmeg
pinch of salt
1 cup sugar
1 large egg, beaten
1 tea vanilla
1 1/2 cups flour

Preheat oven to 350 and spay a loaf pan.
In a mixing bowl mash bananas with a fork until smooth. Stir in melted butter, mix in the baking soda and salt. Stir in sugar, beaten egg, and vanilla. Mix in the flour.
Pour the batter into prepared pan and bake for 50 minutes to one hour or until tester comes out clean.
Let cool in pan for a few minutes, remove from pan and cool completely before serving.
 When you slice into a warm loaf of banana bread and it taste good you know it is a great recipe. Banana bread is always better when you wrap it and let it sit a day or two but this one was good warm. Give it a try and let me know what you think. I added the cinnamon and nutmeg to mine and the extra 1/4 cup sugar, head over to simplyrecipes.com and check out her recipe.

Tessa's Spice Cake

I was in Costco today and these was a new cookbook these and as I was looking through it I came across this recipe and wanted to try it, I have been trying to be good and not buy anymore cookbooks so I came home and looked up the recipe. Let me just say I will be buying this cookbook.  The name of the cookbook  is  Sweet: Desserts from London's Ottolenghi Check it out on Amazon, I think you will love the recipes in it.
Give this recipe a try, you will not regret it. These would make wonderful Christmas gifts. The flavors are a wonderful blend. I wish you all could taste this right now, it is my new favorite. This will be on my dessert table for Christmas for sure.

3/4 cups butter, soften
3/4 cups light brown sugar
3/4 cups dark brown sugar. okay I have to confess, I did not have dark brown sugar so I added some molasses, about 1/8 cup
finely grated zest of 1 large orange
3 large eggs
1/2 sour cream
1 T vanilla
1 t pumpkin spice mix
1 3/4 cup flour
3/4 t salt
1 t apple cider vinegar
Powder sugar for dusting

Preheat oven to 350 spray a loaf pan and put parchment paper on the bottom and set aside.

I will be adding powder sugar when it cools,I think it is
perfect without it.

Place the butter, sugars and orange zest in mixing bowl with paddle attachment and beat on medium high speed until light and smooth.
In a separate bowl whisk together the eggs by hand. Add sour cream and vanilla and whisk until smooth.
Sift together pumpkin pie spice, flour and salt together into a separate bowl and set aside/
In alternating batches with the machine on medium low speed, add a third of the egg-sour cream mixture to the creamed mixture, followed by a third of the flour mixture, continue with the second and third and beat until combined. In a separate small bowl combine the baking soda and the vinegar together, this mixture will fizz up a little that is fine, add this to the batter and as soon as everything is combine turn off the machine. Don't worry if the mixture starts to split at this point it will still cook up well. Scrape the mixture into the prepared pan and bake for 70 minutes or until skewer comes out clean.
Transfer the loaf to a wire rack and let cook in pan for 15 minutes. Remove from pan and set a side to cool completely, Dust with powder sugar.

Posole

4 Tablespoon olive oil, divided.
1 medium yellow onion, chopped
6 cloves garlic, chopped
3 Tablespoon ancho chili powder
2 teaspoon cumin
14 1/2 oz can diced fired roasted tomatoes
8 cups chicken broth
4 chicken thighs
29 ounce can hominy, drained and rinsed
1/2 cup fresh cilantro, chopped
salt to flavor
Tortilla

In a large dutch oven over medium-high heat, heat 1 tablespoon oil until hot. Add onions and cook and stir for five minutes until lightly browned. While onions are cooking add remaining oil to a frying pan and heat over medium heat until hot, add chicken and cook until brown on each side.  Add the garlic, ancho chili powder and cumin to the onions in dutch oven, cook stirring constantly, until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Add tomatoes and cook, stirring until most of liquid has evaporated, about 4 minutes. Add chicken broth and bring to a simmer. Reduce to medium,add chicken to dutch oven, cover and cook for 20 minutes. Add hominy to dutch oven and cook for another 20 minutes.
Remove chicken, cover the pot and reduce to low to keep hot. Shred chicken into bite size pieces. Season with salt to taste.
Stir chicken back into the pot cook until heated 3-4 minutes. Remove from heat and add cilantro. Serve with warm tortillas.

Just Call Me The Cookie Monster

I have some coworkers coming for dinner tonight, I went to Costco to pick up a pumpkin pie but it did not feel right not making a dessert so I figured I would make some cookies. I bake cookies at least 3-4 times a week, the funny thing is they are probably the one thing I am not that crazy to bake. It could be because at work we would make cases of them.
Here is a fun easy recipe for chocolate chip cookies.I like to stuff them with either Oreo or caramel and these ones are stuffed with Dulce de Leche, I could eat this stuff with a spoon. 😃

Give them a try and let me know what you think.

1 cup butter, soften
1 cup sugar
1 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 teaspoon baking soda mixed with 2 teaspoons hot water.
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup milk chocolate chips
1 bag mini M&M's
1 can Dulce de Leche

you can add nuts, toffee bits, or leave out the M&M's and add another cup of chocolate chips, or chocolate chunks. You can stuff it with a marshmallow, shopped up pretzels. Make it yours, add what you like. Chopped up candy bars. Take a picture and come back and share it with us.

Preheat oven to 350
Cream butter and sugars together until smooth. Beat in eggs one at a time, stir in the vanilla. Dissolve baking soda in hot water and add to batter along with the salt. Stir in the flour and add chocolate chips, and M&M's or anything you like.
drop by teaspoon, on a lined cookie sheet I use a cookies scooper, the thing that looks like a ice cream scooper but smaller.
I put six on a cookie sheet, I put a indent with my finger in the middle of the cookie and fill with Dulce de Leche, then grab a small amount of cookie dough and cover the Dulce de Leche completely up.
Bake for 12 minutes or until edges are nicely brown.

I hope you give this a try and come tell me what you think.