Mushroom Onion Quiche

This year my mom had another book group retreat. Last year, I made Lemon Cake with Chocolate Buttercream and Vanilla Yogurt Cake with Orange Glaze. This year, I made 3 different dishes. The first one is this Mushroom Onion Quiche, a quiche that my mom used to make back when she went to college. It's super easy and you can easily use a frozen crust (which I did, and then baked it and let it cool ahead of time) to cut down the time even more.

My Mom's College Mushroom-Onion Quiche

1 prebaked, 9-inch pie crust
1 cup sliced mushrooms
1 cup chopped onions
1/2 cup grated swiss cheese plus 1 tsp flour
3 eggs
1 1/2 cup milk
1 tsp salt
1/8 tsp pepper

Saute onions and mushrooms. Remove when onions are soft and transparent. Cool and spread on bottom of prebaked pie shell.

Toss cheese with flour and sprinkle over mushrooms and onions. Beat eggs with remaining ingredients until well mixed, and pour over mixture.

Bake at 375F for 30-35 minutes, or until a knife inserted at center and edge comes out clean. Let stand for 10 minutes.

Chinese Pork and Egg Stir Fry

I got this recipe from Chinese One Dish Meals, a book my mom had at home, and it turned out really great. I think adding more egg and maybe some broccoli would have been good too. I'm not sure if the version you can buy at amazon (linked above) is the same that my mom has, but basically you marinate pork with soy sauce, cooking wine, and cornstarch; stir fry that, scramble some eggs, stir fry some spinach, and then some veggies (I followed the recipe and added onions, mushrooms, and carrots), and gradually add them all together with water, salt, sugar, cornstarch, sesame oil, and pepper. The exact recipe you can look for in the book, or you can probably whip up something similar yourself. I just thought everything went together well and it tasted great!

Oatmeal Craisin Cookies

My mom tore this recipe out of her Penzey's magazine and said she was going to try to have time to make them. So I made them for her. They were okay straight out of the oven, but I think I like them better after having cooled, maybe best a few days after they are baked.

Oatmeal Craisin Cookies
Recipe from Penzeys Spices

1 Cup butter, softened
3/4 Cup sugar
3/4 Cup light brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp. PURE VANILLA EXTRACT
1 1/2 Cups flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1to 2 tsp CINNAMON (we used CHINA)
3 Cups cooking oats
1 6 oz pkg Craisins
1/2 Cup mini chocolate chips (optional)

Preheat oven to 350°.
Cream the butter and sugars until well blended.
Add the eggs and PURE VANILLA EXTRACT and blend well.

Sift together the flour, baking soda, and CINNAMON. Add to the creamed mixture and mix well.
Add the oats, craisins, and chocolate chips if you opt for them. Stir until mixed well.

Drop by rounded teaspoons onto ungreased cookie sheets about 2 inches apart.

Bake for 10-12 minutes.

Chocolate Chip Banana Bread

This bread was great! I made it along with the quiche I posted last week, for father's day this year. Yes, regular banana bread is great, too, but I think that the chocolate chips in this one make it so that the bread tastes good even at room temperature. Sure, regular banana bread is fine, but in my opinion it tastes better warm or heated up...this one does, too, but you can enjoy it either way!

Chocolate Chip Banana Bread
Recipe from The Family Kitchen

1 stick unsalted butter
1 cup granulated sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon good vanilla extract
3 ripe bananas, mashed
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon cinnamon
¾ cup mini chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350. Butter and flour a standard 9×5 loaf pan*.

Mix together butter and sugar until fully combined. Add eggs and vanilla extract, mix well. Add mashed bananas, mix again until completely combined.

In a separate bowl mix flour, soda, nutmeg, cinnamon and chocolate chips. Stir this mixture a few times and make sure the chips are fully coated with flour.

Working slowly, stir flour mixture into egg mixture. Keep stirring until all flour is fully incorporated. The batter may still be a little lumpy from the bananas, this is normal.

Pour batter into prepared loaf pan. Bake for 45 – 50 minutes or until top is golden and a cake tester comes out clean.

Cool in the pan for 10 minutes. Then, carefully remove it from the pan and let it cool on a wire rack before serving.

*You can also divide the batter into smaller loaf pans, or mini loaf pans if you want to make smaller breads.

Freezer Tips: This bread freezes well. If you want to save it for later simply wrap it tightly in plastic wrap. Then wrap it again with an outer layer of aluminum foil. Make sure none of the bread is exposed to air. It will last in the freezer for 2-4 months.

Quiche

I made this quiche for father's day this year, so...a while ago. It was really good and very simple! For father's day breakfast I also made another recipe which I will post next week.

Quiche
Recipe from Allrecipes

8 slices bacon
4 ounces shredded Swiss cheese
2 tablespoons butter, melted
4 eggs, beaten
1/4 cup finely chopped onion
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups milk

Place bacon in a large, deep skillet. Cook over medium high heat until evenly brown. Drain, crumble and set aside.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly grease a 9 inch pie pan.

Line bottom of pie plate with cheese and crumbled bacon. Combine eggs, butter, onion, salt, flour and milk; whisk together until smooth; pour into pie pan.

Bake in preheated oven for 35 minutes, until set. Serve hot or cold.

Red Velvet Cupcakes

For the 4th of July, my parents and I went to my mom's friend's party. My mom made a couple appetizers to bring, and I made the Nutella Cookies I made before, and these cupcakes. By the way, if you haven't seen those nutella cookies, MAKE THEM. Everybody LOVES them. These cupcakes were also a big hit. The FROSTING was the best cream cheese frosting I have ever made. I made a few changes to the original recipe for the frosting, which I show adapted below. This recipe made about 30 cupcakes for me. They were so cute!

Red Velvet Cupcakes
Recipe adapted by Saveur from Apple a Day, found at Annie's Eats

2½ cups cake flour
1½ cups sugar
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tbsp. cocoa powder
1 tsp. salt
2 large eggs
1½ cups vegetable oil
1 cup buttermilk
2 tbsp. (1 oz.) liquid red food coloring
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 tsp. distilled white vinegar

Preheat the oven to 350° F. Line cupcake pans with paper liners. In a medium bowl, combine the cake flour, sugar, baking soda, cocoa powder and salt; whisk to blend. In the bowl of an electric mixer, combine the eggs, vegetable oil, buttermilk, food coloring, vanilla and vinegar. Beat on medium speed until well blended. Mix in the dry ingredients on low speed and beat until smooth, about 2 minutes.

Divide the batter evenly between the prepared liners. Bake, rotating the pans halfway through baking, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 18 minutes. Let cool in the pans 5-10 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

Cream Cheese Frosting
Recipe adapted by me, after being adapted by Annie's Eats from Confections of a Foodie Bride

12 oz. cream cheese
8 tbsp. unsalted butter, room temperature
3 tsp. vanilla extract
3 ¾ cups confectioners’ sugar, sifted

Combine the cream cheese and butter in the bowl of an electric mixer.

Beat on medium-high speed until well combined and smooth, about 2-3 minutes.

Mix in the vanilla extract.

Gradually beat in the confectioners’ sugar until totally incorporated, increase the speed and then beat until smooth.

Frost cooled cupcakes as desired.

Deep Dish Pizza with Mushrooms

Okay, so I'm still a little delayed on the father's day recipes, but I'll get those up soon enough. For now here's some new pictures of another attempt at the Chicago Deep-Dish Pizza (recipe found clicking this link). I should probably have kept it in the oven longer for the crust to get a little crispier, and I probably should have let it sit out longer than 5-10 minutes after the oven so that the cheese would settle, but overall it was delicious! This time I chopped up 2 mushrooms to spread on top. It got a little liquidy. My mom suggests quickly stirfrying the mushrooms before putting them on the pizza, to remove the extra moisture, but it was still fine: the water wasn't too bad.

Peach Cobbler

I bake some things for Father's Day last weekend, but they're on my mom's camera and we're away for the weekend so instead I'm posting Peach Cobbler that I made last week. We had a bunch of peaches on the counter and so I found a great recipe and tried it! This recipe is super easy and really delicious. Definitely make it with the self rising flour. I didn't have any heavy whipping cream so we used cool whip, but serving it with either one is fine, or also vanilla ice cream. It was delicious warm, but served refrigerated it's also really really good. If you ever have too many ripe peaches that you need to do something with, you should try this out. I used about 7-8 peaches for this recipe, and using more wouldn't have hurt.
When making this recipe I was afraid that it would turn out strange: you melt butter in the pan, then pour in the crust mixture, and then add all the peaches and peach juices on top without mixing it. The butter does get distributed, and the crust rises it to the top while it bakes. I didn't end up adding any cinnamon because I forgot, even though I had it out...didn't matter, either way would have been great!

Peach Cobbler
Recipe by Paula Deen

4 cups peeled, sliced peaches
2 cups sugar, divided
1/2 cup water
8 tablespoons butter
1 1/2 cups self-rising flour
1 1/2 cups milk
Ground cinnamon, optional

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Combine the peaches, 1 cup sugar, and water in a saucepan and mix well. Bring to a boil and simmer for 10 minutes. Remove from the heat.

Put the butter in a 3-quart baking dish and place in oven to melt.

Mix remaining 1 cup sugar, flour, and milk slowly to prevent clumping. Pour mixture over melted butter. Do not stir. Spoon fruit on top, gently pouring in syrup. Sprinkle top with ground cinnamon, if using. Batter will rise to top during baking. Bake for 30 to 45 minutes.

To serve, scoop onto a plate and serve with your choice of whipped cream or vanilla ice cream.

Nutella Chocolate Chip Cookies

These are SO. GOOD. So make them. I found the recipe adapted from another recipe and ended up making some changes (had no mini chocolate chips so I made it all normal size, and then added a whole cup. Also, I didn't have unsalted butter so I used salted and then omitted the extra salt...and then accidentally added the whole stick of butter instead of 7 tbsp, but they turned out GREAT). I made them for my friend Rose's graduation (congrats yayy) party, but she didn't even get to eat any! One second they were there, sitting on a plate unopened on the counter. Next time I looked they had all disappeared. I guess they were a hit. Make them! They're so good, and so easy!

Nutella Chocolate Chip Cookies
Adapted from Sugar Cooking, who adapted it from Alpineberry

1 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
1 tbsp unsweetened cocoa
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp of salt, if using unsalted butter
1 stick butter, at room temp
2/3 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup light brown sugar
2/3 cup Nutella (chocolate hazelnut spread)
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 large egg
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Mix together flour, cocoa, cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Set aside dry ingredients.
Cream together butter, granulated sugar and brown sugar until light and fluffy. Mix in Nutella and vanilla extract. Mix in egg.

Add flour mixture and mix until just incorporated. Add chocolate chips.

Chill for 1 hour. (This step can be skipped if you want, but I always chill my cookie dough because I think it makes a huge difference).

Drop tablespoons of dough 2 inches apart onto parchment lined baking sheets. Bake at 350 for about 11 minutes until the edges look set. Cool on baking sheet for 5 minutes then carefully remove to cooling racks.

Thanks for waiting...

A new post will finally be up tomorrow! And it's super delicious and easy so make sure to try it out!