Fam day with homemade foodness!

Every Sunday our Fam bam attends the noon catholic mass at the church my hubby and I were wed 3 years ago and where our son was baptized.

My Hubby and I are fairly active in the church. We both are Lector readers. I am a eucharistic minister and Hubby is an usher.

After church my step dad makes awesome lunches. Homestyle remakes of some popular dishes!

some examples are pastor tacos, Cuban sandwiches, skyline chili, philly cheese steaks.

Today we had a classic Jewish meal! Matzo ball soup, reuben sandwiches, potato latkes and black & white cookies. It was delicious!

The pictures in this post will show our plethora of goodness! I'm in straight up glutton mode!

I should work this off but instead I'm in their massage chair getting a massage. cie la vie!

peace-zils,

Ree

Published with Blogger-droid v1.5.2

Sweeter Brownies...

On Friday, I attempted to make another batch of cake calls but with a twist - cheesecake brownies with vanilla chocolate coating.

I was inspired by the brownie cheese cake from bakerella.com's website.

I took the recipe for the brownies from allrecipes.com

I got the recipe for the cheese cake topping from bakerella.com

The cheesecake was a little mushy but overall decent!

After baking them in the oven at 350 for 40 minutes, I let completely cool and cut them into 1x1 inch squares. I had gotten a silicone ice cube tray in the shape of stars at the 99 store the other day. I pushed the brownies into the mold and removed it. a couple brownies came out a cute star shape.

The next several brownies became mushy when I tried putting them into the mold so I decided to put into the freezer to hold shape overnight. The next day, I took the star ice cube trays out of the freezer. It didn't seem to hold form. The brownies began to crumble and stay in the tray. Those were a lost cause but I still had about 15 square and 5 decent star shaped brownies ready for coating.

The chocolate melting was interesting. I previously melted the chocolate by putting them into plastic Tupperware bowls and microwaving for 10 - 15 seconds, stirring, and putting it back to the microwave until it was pretty thinned out. So the other option was stove top, I tried my hand with double bowl melting the chocolate - metal bowl over a pot that had boiling water. Either I wasn't doing it right or wasn't being patient enough but it was just all wrong. The chocolate didn't want to melt down to the thinned out consistency I wanted. I had tried coating a couple of the brownies but it just breaking my brownies apart. It was a mess! I tried another batch and just put it into the microwave. I used my previous method and it worked well until I added the food coloring. The chocolate started to stiffen up rather than thin out. I read a tip on the back of the almond bark wrapper and it mentioned using a tablespoon of crisco to thin out. Wow, what a difference! I used just half of a teaspoon and it worked wonders! Before my patience wore thin I was able to coat 20 brownies (some square, some star, some with bad melted chocolate, some with good chocolate).

From this brownie experience, my next times will be:

1. Be patient. Don't be bummed out if it doesn't work out the first time - if it does, I got lucky. The motto "practice makes perfect" is great - we aren't perfect (as much as we want try to be) when going into something new. Experience the process!
2. Some recipes you find online may not always work out the way pictures portray it to be. (It's sad to see things you make not work out and you just have wasted food) - keep expectations low. ;o/
3. READ THE LABELS or TIPS!! It may help in the long run (to avoid wasted food and frustration).
4. Time your projects so you aren't rushing.
5. Invest and use cookie cutters - silicone ice cube trays should be used for.... ICE
6. Do 1 project at a time. (At the time of coating the brownies, I was getting dinner ready for the family - Skyline chili).

PHOTOS:

A look of my attempt to these sweets. (click here for more pics)

This is the unglamorous side of making these sweets but after a couple more attempts it'll hopefully look cuter.

I also had my hand of baking a red velvet cake with cheesecake frosting but that'll have to be a whole seperate post!! Stay tuned..

Peace-zils,

Ree

test from the incredible (Droid that is)

took one of the pictures that my phone had and attached it to this post.

I downloaded the Blogger-Droid app onto my phone. I hope this keep me in touch with my blog more often.

we shall see! in the sack, about to rack.

peace-zils,

Ree

Published with Blogger-droid v1.4.9

Who you're about to meet....

I'm Ree Racoma.

Anti-social when I can be. Optimistic about doing different things but too lazy to. I like to randomly do the robot. A wifey & a first time mom.

Since the life changing event of my son being born, I've transferred majority of my allotted time from work to my first child, nugget. With more time spent at home, I've been looking for other creative outlets to channel my energies to, that is when I have a free chance between feedings and play time.

My past time consists of family, nugget, cooking, baking, google-ing, youtube-ing, looking up recipes and watching TV.

I'm most interested in making my favorite dishes from restaurants at home. I'm researching this rave about cake pops and making things with fondant. I'm hooked on Glee, Vampire Diaries and True Blood. I like audio books because of the ability to be hands free to feed an infant and be able to hear a book through the end.

I get bored easy and tend to have many unfinished projects. When I get interested in a project, I invest a lot into the start up upfront before realizing how much I really like it.

This blog will follow me along my journey of avocation discovery and couple of bumps in the road of random stuff.

Welcome to a snippet of my world...

Peace-zils,