Peach Scones

I’ve never tasted scones so I don’t really know what they are.  I’ve been curious about them since watching the Barefoot Contessa Ina Garten make them in her show.  I thought they were like cookies but I didn’t really know what to expect.

I wanted to try making some scones and since we had a can of peaches sitting around, I decided to make some peach scones.

I certainly didn’t expect the dough to be so wet.  I guess I should have since there’s cream mixed in it.  So instead of shaping it on a flat surface then cutting out the shapes, I just scooped it out using our biggest ice cream scoop.  My kids helped in brushing the tops with cream and sprinkling the sugar on top.  I just used regular sugar instead of cinnamon sugar since my kids are not big fans of cinnamon.

I didn’t really know what to expect but it came out softer than I thought.  And I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that it wasn’t too sweet since the recipe only called for 4 tablespoons of sugar.  My kids ate one each but they didn’t really like it so much.  I think I shouldn’t have added the almond extract as the smell was quite strong and a bit of a turn-off for the kids.

I was thinking it would be like cookies but it’s more like bread.  Jon decided to spread some butter on it and that made it better.  I guess it would go well with butter and jam.  It was okay but I probably won’t be making this again soon (since I had to eat most of it!).  At least I got to cross one item of my list!  Yey!

 

Pizza lunch!

I’ve promised my kids that we’ll have home made pizza every month and they’re always looking forward to the day that they can make their own pizza.  Unfortunately, we didn’t get to do it for August since I ran out of ingredients.  We just had delivery that month.

So, after shopping for ingredients on Saturday, they wanted to have pizza on Sunday and of course I obliged.

I’ve always wanted to try pesto on pizza and since I still have some pesto left-over, I knew I could finally make it this time.  But, we also have a lot of toppings available so I also wanted some of that.  We had bacon, burger, mushroom, garlic, onions, mozzarella and parmesan.  So, since I want it all, I decided to make my pizza half and half (or more of one third and two thirds).

Jon was also undecided so he made his half oil-based and half tomato sauce-based (sorry, it’s a bit unfocused, I was hungry already).

Jari’s pizza was the best looking of the bunch.  He’s really fixated on stuffed crust so he made a big crust with mozzarella inside and really had a lot of toppings on his pizza.

Yumi’s pizza also had a stuffed crust but a bit smaller.

Unfortunately, I didn’t have any pictures of the adults’ pizzas after it was baked.  We were too hungry.  In the same way that I didn’t have pictures of the kids’ pizzas before baking because theirs went in the oven first.

I just want to say that I loved the pesto pizza.  I should have made mine all pesto (and just get a slice from everybody else so I could also have some taste of the toppings).  I will definitely make my next one just pesto.

We definitely had a great lunch.  Let’s eat!

 

Mini Frittatas

I haven’t baked any goodies in about three weeks now.  We ran out of supplies, like flour and sugar and haven’t had the opportunity to buy some.  If we aren’t busy, it’s raining.  I miss baking and using my oven.

So, when my daughter requested to have potato frittata this week, I decided to use the oven for it.  I’ve seen some blogs making frittatas using muffin tins and I decided to give it a try.

Just like the last time, I cooked the potatoes and cabbage first before assembling the frittata.  Just brush the sides of the pan with oil, put in the vegetables at the bottom, add some cheese, then top with the scrambled eggs.  I mixed in some cream with the eggs this time to make it more creamy then I topped it off with parmesan cheese.  Just bake for about 15 – 20 in a 180-degree Celsius oven.  Let’s eat!

 

Mini Pancake Rolls

I’m always on the look-out for ways to make weekend breakfasts better.  There’s no rush to go anywhere and we could all enjoy our food but at the same time, no one wants to go to a lot of trouble cooking something first thing in the morning.  So when I saw these Mini Pancake Cinnamon Rolls, I knew I had to give it a try.

Pancakes are one of our breakfast staples anyway and it just takes a few extra steps to turn it into something extra special.  Besides, I had 2 pairs of little hands helping out in rolling the pancakes.

I had to change the drizzle recipe though.  Aside from the fact that we didn’t have cream cheese or sour cream, my family also didn’t feel like having it cinnamon flavored (which is so weird since we all love cinnamon rolls).  Anyway, I browsed the web to look for recipes and I found Paula Deen’s glaze simple enough but I couldn’t believe that I have to use 2 cups of powdered sugar.  So I kinda tweaked it a bit and I just melted about 2 T of butter, added about 3 T of milk and whisked in 1 cup of powdered sugar until smooth and at a consistency I liked.

After all the pancakes have been rolled, time to drizzle…

Jon and Yumi also sprinkled theirs with Milo

Give it a try this weekend!  Let’s eat!

 

Rock Garden Cake

Last week was Jari’s 11th birthday.  I wanted to make him something special but I couldn’t really bake a real cake yet.  When I came across this dirt cake,  I knew I wanted to make something similar.  He loves playing soccer so I’m thinking a soccer field would be good.

I kinda followed the recipe but instead of instant pudding, I made one from scratch.  It turned out pretty good.

I wasn’t really feeling well that weekend but I know I have to push through with this project specially since I showed my daughter the pictures and she was looking forward to making and decorating the cake.  I’ve also bought some chocolate rocks and green sprinkles for grass.

In the end, I prepared the filling and crushed the Oreos and Jon assemble the layers.  The kids decorated it, even doing rock balancing.  The cake was great on its own but I found it too sweet with the sprinkles and the chocolates.  I’ll probably do this again if I can buy crushed Oreos since that was the most time consuming task for me (I just used our coffee grinder and it can only crush 2 cookies at a time!)

Overall, we had a great time with this cake and I’m looking forward to more cooking adventures with my family!