Every now and again you find amazing things on the internet.  The item below I consider to be one of those items.  In surfing around for breakfast ideas for last week’s delivery, I stumbled on to Steph’s site at Plain Chicken and looked repeatedly at this cinnamon pull apart bread.  I knew it was a must try.

Instructions sounded pretty straight forward and it used bought bread ( which was a bonus based on timing) and the combination of honey butter and cinnamon – really?  Do I have to go any further.  All be it is a slight change from yogurt and fruit for breakfast, but every now and again you need to go off the wall and indulge.  It helps your mind stay focused on your goals.

Trust me.

Indulge once a week and you will be happy.

Left: zoom shot of the butter prior to baking Right: Close up of the Glaze... YUM!

Lubed up all over with the honey cinnamon butter ( I could have ate the whole loaf at this stage.

Ingredients

• 1 unsliced round loaf sourdough bread
• 1/2 Cup butter, softened
• 1/4 Cup powdered sugar
• 1/4 Cup honey
• 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 1/4 tsp cinnamon
• 1 cup powdered sugar
• 1-2 Tbsp milk

Method

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. To make Vanilla Honey Butter: Whip butter and 1/4 cup powdered sugar together until smooth; stir in honey and vanilla.  Set aside. (You can use regular butter if desired)
3. Cut the bread lengthwise into 1/2″ slices, without cutting through the bottom crust. Spread vanilla honey butter in between slices.  Rotate the bread 90 degrees and slice the bread again into 1/2″ pieces, without cutting through the bottom crust. Spread more vanilla honey butter in between new cuts. This doesn’t need to be perfect – just make sure there is lots of butter in between all the cuts.
4. Combine sugar and cinnamon. Generously sprinkle in between all cuts. (You may have extra butter and cinnamon sugar.
5. It will just depend on how large your bread loaf is.)
6. Wrap in foil; place on a baking sheet. Bake at 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes, until bread is warm.  Unwrap cinnamon bread and place on serving platter.  Combine powdered sugar and milk – adding milk until you get the consistency desired.
7. Drizzle icing over bread and serve immediately.
8. ENJOY!

Zesty Tip:  I would recommend using an electric knife to cut the bread so you don’t push the bread down too much.  The first loaf I made, on the second cu,  it was hard not to push down on the sticks of bread “squashing” them.  The second loaf, I used the electric knife and made all the difference in the world.

After the glaze.... right out of the oven

Have a great weekend… ENJOY the super bowl and I will talk to you on Monday after the game.

Take care

zesty

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Need I Say More?

I didn’t think so… but I will.

I was stumbling through the internet to some of my favorite sites to prepare for a dinner party on Saturday night when I hit these little morsels of magic.  Two peas and their pod delivered a Chocolate Chip Salted Caramel bar that caught my eye.  Ok, well maybe caught more than my eye.  I had to go grab a wipe and clean off the keypad after checking these out!

I followed their instructions to a tee and the results were delicious.  The only thing I would change…. is the first time i served them, I just cut them from the pan, threw on a dollop of ice cream and called it a dessert.  The next two times I ate them… yes I know.  I warmed the square in the microwave for 30 seconds… well you can guess the rest.  AMAZING

Ingredients

Method

 Zesty Tip:  Definitely watch these fellas in the oven.  Do a test at around 25 minutes depending on your oven.  Better to under cook than over cook them and dry it out.

I really think you should try these and be sure to share with your friends other wise you will eat the whole pan.  Seriously.

Talk on Wednesday.

Take care

zesty

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Friday is here…. weekend is upon us!  Thanks for all the nice comments, emails and tweets about my new adventure.  So far so good and it is FUN.  This morning I woke up a little extra early, 5:00am to do some baking for Mrs. Zesty as she was tasked to provide breakfast for her staff today.  I didn’t mind getting up and I had a solid plan in place to execute and had 2.5 hours to complete.

On the Menu

• 2 Dozen Banana Bread Doughnuts( minus two for quality assurance testing )
• 2 Dozen  Sugar Topped Blueberry Nutmeg muffins
• 2 Sour Dough Loaves Cinnamon Pull Apart Bread ( I know… sounds kinda crazy but it looked good.  No testing done on this one – will have to wait on word from the crew)

Today, We will focus on donuts.  Baked doughnuts to be specific.  Not too often you run into a baked doughnut but I was surfing the internet the other day for some breakfast ideas and I stumbled across Laurie’s recipe from Simply Scratch for Banana Walnut Breakfast Doughnuts.  I took a quick read thru and looked at her pictures and I thought…. what the heck.  Let’s give it a try.

Not sure mine came out as pretty as Laurie’s but I did buy a fancy new doughnut pan yesterday to get the full effect.  I opted to leave out the walnuts as Mrs. Zesty is not a huge fan and I used frozen bananas so it was tricky to keep the bananas chunky. Here is the lowdown below

Ingredients

• Butter for greasing pan{s}
• 1-1/2 Cups All Purpose Flour
• 3/4 Cup Light Brown Sugar, packed
• 1/2 Tsp. Baking Soda
• 1/2 Tsp. Kosher Salt
• 1/4 Tsp. Baking Powder
• 1/4 Tsp. Cinnamon
• 1/4 Tsp. Nutmeg, freshly grated
• 2 ripe Bananas
• 1 whole Egg
• 1/2 Cup Unsweetened Applesauce
• 1/2 Tbsp. Real Vanilla Extract

Glaze

• 3 oz. Cream Cheese, softened
• 3 Tbsp. Powdered Sugar
• 2 Tbsp. Whole Milk
• 1/4 Tsp. Real Vanilla Extract

Method

1. Preheat your oven to 325 degrees, and grease your doughnut pan with butter.
2. In a large bowl; add the light brown sugar and sift in the flour, baking soda and powder, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg, set aside.
3. In a medium bowl, roughly mash up the two bananas leaving them pretty chunky. Add in the applesauce, egg and vanilla. Stir until all the ingredients are incorporated.
4. Add the wet ingredients to the dry and mix until combined.
5. Spoon batter into prepared doughnut pan and fill up 3/4 of the way.



6. Bake in a preheated 325 degree oven for 17-20 minutes or until the edges start to pull away from the pan and the doughnuts bounce back when gently pressed. {I’d stick closer to the 17 minute mark.}
7. While the doughnuts cool, combine the cream cheese, powdered sugar and vanilla, stir. Pour in whole milk while whisking until desired consistency.
8. Dunk doughnuts into glaze and set on a wire rack.
9. ENJOY!

Zesty Tip:  I think I would make one alteration the next time.  I think I would substitute the apple sauce for butter.  I would melt the butter in with the wet ingredients in hopes that would break down the gluten in the flour to create a lighter airy doughnut.

Alright fellas, I better clean up the kitchen here.  it looks like it got hit with a small hurricane.  Have a great weekend and I will talk to you on Monday.

Take care

zesty

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Happy Friday to you!  Another week gone by and it is Friday the 13th.  Good luck for some bad luck for others.. lets hope for some good luck.  So let me start into a little story behind these cookies. A while back we attended a benefit dance/bake sale on  for a colleague of Mrs. Zesty and well of course I get somewhat excited when I hear bake sale.  We chatted about it and tried to come up with some fun ideas on what to bring to the “table”.

It turns out we came up with a few ideas:

• Double Chocolate Chunk Brownies
• Toffee Bit Chocolate Cookies
• Sweet & Salty Cookies

As you can guess from the title of the post I decided to share the Sweet & Salty morsels of goodness.  These fellas were delicious ( I had to taste test just to ensure quality).  Packed with pretzels, m&m, smarties and a few potato chips… I could eat these all day.   Super easy to make and check out my packaging idea(s) – Mrs. Zesty really thinks I am a bit over the top sometimes. Ha!  We sold each for for $40.  Totally joking… not even sure what the amount was but I had fun making them.

Ingredients

• 1 Cup unsalted butter
• 3/4 Cup Granulated white sugar
• 3/4 Cup Brown sugar
• 2 Eggs
• 1 Tsp.  Vanilla
• 2 1/3 Cups All-purpose flour
• 1 Tsp. Baking soda
• 3/4 Tsp. Salt
• 1 Cup chopped candy coated pieces
• 1 Cup crushed or jumbled savoury snacks such as pretzels and potato chips

Method

1. In a large bowl, beat butter, and both sugars until fluffy.
2. Beat in eggs, one at a time; beat in vanilla
3. Whisk together flour, baking soda, and salt; stir into butter mixture.
4. Stir in candy and crumbled snacks.
5. Drop balls onto parchment paper- lined baking sheets
6. Bake in oven at 350 degrees for about 10-12 minutes  rotating the pan halfway through.

1. Makes about 30 cookies
2. ENJOY!

Zesty Tip: Make these cookies ahead and store in an air tight container for up to 3 days.  Good luck having them last that long.

Alright, I hope you have a great start to the weekend and I really hope you give these cookies a try.  I think we can call these cookies…. “clean out your pantry with whatever goodies you have cookies”.  I will talk to you all on Monday.

Take care

zesty

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Momma zesty has baked her fair share of blueberry muffins and all of them inspire this post.  I love blueberries and as you likely heard before anything like “bread” I adore.  Some years when I was smaller we would pick and freeze blueberries in the summer, then take them out of the freezer and jam as many blueberries as we could in each muffin.  For this batch, we bought some blueberries off a local organic farmer and went too work – minus my mom.

There is nothing better than a warm soft muffin from the oven with a pat of butter the top. YUM.  These are simple to make and pay close attention to the tip at the bottom.  I made many a “tough” muffin in my day until I realized the science behind flour.

Ingredients

• 2 1/2 Cups All Purpose Flour
• 2 Tbsp. Baking Powder
• 1 Tsp. Nutmeg
• 1/2 Tsp. Salt
• 4 Eggs
• 1 Cup Brown sugar
• 1 Cup Milk
• 1 Cup melted butter
• 1 Tbsp. Vanilla
• 2 Cups Blueberries, frozen or fresh
• 1/4 Cup White sugar

Method

1. Preheat oven to 400 F.  Light oil or butter the cups and top surface of a standard 12 – muffin pan
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, nutmeg and salt.  In a separate bowl add the eggs, brown sugar, milk, butter and vanilla.
3. Pour the wet into the dry mixture.  Stir together with a few quick strokes until a lump batter forms.
4. Spoon the mixture into the muffin cups and top with some white sugar.
5. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until golden brown and a toothpick comes out clean after insertion.
6. Rest on a rack for a few minutes.  Serve with butter and your favorite liquid.
7. ENJOY!

Zesty Tip: Beating a batter until a form of smoothness develops strong gluten in the flour.  This will cause your muffins to be tough.  By just applying a few strokes and leaving the batter lumpy, this will allow the muffins to be tender.

Can you believe it is 2012? The time is flying but all we can do is embrace it.  If you are a regular reader of zesty, sit back and get ready for some interesting happenings for 2012 and if you are new to the zesty world.. welcome aboard.  No need to fasten your seat belt, we operate pretty slow and safe but hang in there and have fun.

I will be back on Wednesday with … well I don’t know yet.  Depends on what I cook in the next couple of days.

Take care

zesty

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Happy Monday!

Last night Zesty Junior approached me and asked if we could make a special dessert.  Of course I said sure buddy tell me what you are thinking.  Well Dad, remember those butterscotch chips I found in the pantry?  I was thinking we could make a cookie using those because nobody has ever done that before.  Sounds good, I said – let’s get at it.

Before getting right into the batter, I took a spin around the blogsphere for some interesting butterscotch chip cookie recipes.  I came up with a few but none that really blew my mind.  The I stopped over at The Pioneer Woman to see what she had in the cookie department.  Needless to say this was my last stop on the tour.  I stumbled onto her Monster Cookie and fell in love.  I altered it quite a bit from some of the add-ons as I didnt have them on hand and of course we had to use the main star ” butterscotch chips”  but other than that followed her recipe to a “T”.  As they were baking in the oven the whole gang was wondering when they would be ready.

The smell was amazing.  After about 11 minutes I removed them from the oven and let them rest for a minute and then moved them to a cooling rack.  Let’s be honest here….. they did not sit on the cooling rack for more than a minute.  We tossed some on a plate poured 4 glasses of milk and devoured the cookies.  Consensus in the room were 4 thumbs up!  I tested 4 cookies just to make sure they were all good..

Ingredients

• 2 sticks (1/2 Pound) Butter (salted) Softened
• 1/2 Cup White Sugar
• 1-1/2 Cup Brown Sugar, Packed
• 2 Large Eggs
• 1 Tbsp.Vanilla Extract
• 1-1/2 Cup All-purpose Flour
• 1/2 Tsp. Baking Soda
• 1 Tsp. Baking Powder
• 2 Tsp. Kosher Salt
• 1-1/2 Cup Oats (either Quick Or Regular)
• 1/2 Cup Smarties
• 1/2 Cup Butterscotch chips
• 3/4 Cups Chocolate Chips (milk Or Semi-sweet)
• 2-1/4 Cups Rice Krispies

Method

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
2. Cream butter with sugars until fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add vanilla and beat.
3. Combine flour, baking soda, baking powder, and kosher salt. Add to mixing bowl and mix till combined.
4. After that, add in remaining ingredients in whatever quantity you prefer. The chocolate butterscotch additions can be added to your liking.
5. Add Rice Krispies at the very end, mixing until just combined. Do not overmix!
6. Use a spoon to drop balls of dough onto a cookie sheet. Bake until golden brown, then allow to cool on a rack.

Zesty Tip: Don’t overcook this fellas.  One batch I left in a little longer and they crisp up on the bottom pretty quickly.  Unless you like a crunchy cookie – watch out  for these in the oven.  I would go 11 minutes tops.

Alright, well I am a bit behind schedule today.  I have a tonne of things to wrap up before I leave for California tomorrow.  I will see you on Wednesday from sunny Anaheim with another update.  Have a great start to the week and keep smiling.

Take care

zesty

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Happy Monday!   Why did I make applesauce based muffins?  Well, Saturday we were shopping and the kids were strolling down the aisle with us and all of a sudden I hear…. let’s buy applesauce , let’s buy applesauce.  I was like… ummm OK so I picked up the 6 individual servings of unsweetened applesauce and kept moving.  Later that night after supper, zesty junior asked for some apple sauce.  Immediately within seconds princess zesty asked for the same thing.

After a total of 30 seconds… all I hear was  – oh yuck.  I DON’T like this, I DON’T like this.  Oh dear…. why in the world did we buy it?  Oh I thought I would like it Dad – me too dad.  The muffin was born.

Now, I never seem to have super success with muffins either a:) because they are too boring and dry or b:) because I eat them all when they are baked.  Both somewhat of a problem.  I knew I could not throw this applesauce in the garbage so away I went.

Ingredients

• 1 Egg
• 1 Cup applesauce
• 2/3 Cup buttermilk
• 1/3 Cup packed brown sugar
• 1/4 Cup fancy molasses
• 2 Tbsp. vegetable oil
• 1 Tsp. vanilla
• 1 Cup natural wheat bran
• 3/4 Cup ground flax seed
• 2 Cups all-purpose flour
• 1 Tsp. baking soda
• 1 Tsp. cinnamon
• 1 Tsp. salt
• 1 Cup chopped apple

Preparation

1. Place oven rack in center of oven; turn on heat to 375°F (190°C). Brush each muffin cup lightly with oil or line with paper liner; set aside.
2. Break egg into large bowl. Measure applesauce, buttermilk, brown sugar, molasses, oil and vanilla into same bowl. Whisk together with egg until smooth.
3. Add bran, apple  and flax seed and with a wooden spoon, stir well. Set aside for 5 minutes for bran to soften and absorb some of the liquid.
4. Measure flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt into separate large bowl. Move applesauce mixture over dry ingredients.  Stir together until combined and no streaks of flour remain.
5. Using ice cream scoop or large spoon, fill muffin cups to the top with batter. Bake for about 22-25 minutes or until golden and domed and tops feel firm to the touch.
6. Remove from oven to rack and let cool for 5 minutes. Lift muffins out of pans and let cool completely on rack.
7. ENJOY!

Zesty Tip: Muffins can be wrapped individually in plastic wrap, enclosed in an airtight container or large freezer bag and frozen for up to 2 weeks.

Alright, the verdict on the muffins were decent.  They were flavorful and moist but I think I may have mixed the batter too long as the outside of the muffins were kind of tough.  Does anyone know the real trick to making an amazing muffin?  Let me know because I do like to eat them.

Have a great Monday and I will be back on Wednesday.

Take care

zesty

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Hi ALl, I have a repost for today.  Just traveling back home from Philly this morning and I really didn’t have much time to prepare anything new and fun.  The conference was very busy but enjoyable, however looking to get back home to see the little turkies and Mrs. Zesty.  Enjoy the sugar cookies and I will see you on Monday.

Do you like cookies?  I love them and these may be the best darn sugar cookies you ever sunk your teeth, gums or dentures into.  Now I can not take full credit as it is my Mom’s recipe but when these sugar cookies are cooked right – these are definitely super star cookies.

These sugar cookies are not difficult to make and I love how chewy they are.  Have these along side a tall chilled glass of milk and you’ll never turn back!

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 Cups butter, softened
• 2 Cups white sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1 Tsp. vanilla extract
• 5 Cups all-purpose flour
• 2 Tsp. baking powder
• 1 Tsp. salt

Method

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until smooth.
3. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Stir in the flour, baking powder, and salt.
4. Cover, and chill dough for at least one hour.
5. Roll out dough on floured surface 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick.
6. Cut into shapes with any cookie cutter.
7. Place cookies 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheets.
8. Bake 6 to 8 minutes in preheated oven.
9. Cool completely.

Zesty Tip: When asked to preheat your oven in the recipe, ensure you follow those directions and do not start the baking process before the oven is preheated.

Things are looking up. I hope you have a great day and let me know what you think of these cookies.

Take care

zesty

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A While ago I was going through a coconut addiction… wow that sounds weird but true. I was craving anything with coconut not matter if it was super star toast modified to add coconut, coconut crusted salmon, the 90 second macaroons or of course these babies that I want to share with you today.

During my addiction, I had given these a try because I had always thought macaroons were difficult and time consuming to prepare.  They are not!  Joy from Joy of Baking inspired me to make these and I used her recipe to a “T” and they were AMAZING!

As you can see below, you can whip this up this afternoon after you read this and still have time to cut the grass before the weekend.

The tender sweetness of the coconut will have you eating more than one for sure.  I love when the top part of the coconut gets toasted and golden brown.  Sometimes I even melt a little dark chocolate and dip half of the macaroon.  Call me weird but I love to eat this cold right out of the fridge.  Some peeps love them warm from the oven or room temperature but I like them chilly.

Ingredients

• 4 Large egg whites, at room temperature
• 1 Cup granulated white sugar
• 1/4 Tsp. salt
• 1 Tsp. pure vanilla extract
• 1/2 Cup cake flour, sifted
• 3 Cups sweetened shredded coconut

Method

1. In a heatproof bowl, placed over a saucepan of simmering water, whisk together the egg whites, sugar, and salt. When this mixture is warm to the touch, and nice and creamy, remove from heat and stir in the vanilla extract, flour, and coconut.
2. Cover and refrigerate for about two hours, or until firm.
3. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F  and line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
4. Place small mounds of the batter on the parchment-lined baking sheet, spacing several inches apart.
5. Bake for about 15 to 20 minutes or until golden brown.
6. Remove from oven and let cool on the baking sheet for about 10 minutes and then place on a wire rack to cool.

Zesty Tip: Do not overcook these.  They will dry out and be disappointing.  Check at the 15 minute mark depending on your oven.

Side topic…. when do you normally cut the grass?  I always try to cut the grass on Thursday night or Friday so it is all done for the weekend and looks good.  Let me know your thoughts on the best day to grass cut.  OK so I am off to work now.  Have a super Friday to wrap up the work week and I will see you all on Monday from Virginia.

Take care

zesty

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Good morning you!  Big day in Zesty land today.  It’s Mrs. Zesty birthday today!!  We don’t have much time after work to celebrate but we will squeeze in some time around supper time to have some fun with the family.  Lately it seems there is not enough hours in the day to get everything done but hopefully that is just a phase.

On to some cookies ( YUM ).  Another cookie we brought for the bake sale last week were Toffee Chocolate Chip cookies.  I really enjoyed the flavor but most of all the texture.  They were soft and chewy with the amazing flavor of toffee and chocolate.  Needless to say the remaining cookies that did not make the bake sale… lasted all of 2 hours on the counter.

Ingredients

• 2/3 Cup unsalted butter, softened
• 3/4 Cup brown sugar
• 1/4 Cup granulated sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 Tsp. Vanilla
• 1 2/3 Cups All purpose flour
• 1/2 Tsp. Baking soda
• 1/2 Tsp. Salt
• 1/2 Cup Toffee bits
• 1/2 Cup semi sweet chocolate chips

Method

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2. In a large bowl, beat butter with both sugars until fluffy; beat in egg and vanilla
3. Stir together flour, baking soda and salt; stir into butter mixture until combined.
4. Toss in toffee bits and chocolate chips.
5. Drop by rounded teaspoon onto parchment paper lined baking sheets.
6. Bake in oven until golden about 10-12 minutes.
7. Let cool on pan and then transfer to cooling rack.

Zesty Tip: Making these cookies in multiple batches was a way to experiment with timing and baking of the cookie.  I preferred the texture around the 9 minute mark especially after they cooled.  They stayed soft and chewy.

Ok so Monday is here, let’s make the best of it!  The weather is sub-par and has been for as long as I can remember.  I need to get the garden planted but am getting a little leery that time is passing.  I may start some plants off as opposed to the seed.  I will touch base with you on Wednesday.

Take care

zesty

Download my Free Recipe Book: Simply Zesty