Charlotte's "Best of Show" Brownies

I found this recipe in the Billings Gazette.

This recipe was the recipe of a lady who died in 2007, but won the "Best of Show" ribbon at the fair for these brownies!

I would give these brownies a ribbon!

They were moist and full of chocolatey goodness!  I ran out of time and didn't even get the frosting made too!  They were delicious without the frosting and I am sure they would be great with too!

You make them in a 9 x 9 pan, which is good because you wont have leftovers to eat all day the next day!

Charlotte's Best of Show Brownies

(Billings Gazette)



• 1 stick (1/2 cup) butter
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup flour
• 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla

Cream butter and sugar.  Add your eggs and combine.  Add your flour and then your cocoa powder.  Stir in 1 tsp vanilla. 

Pour into greased 9 x 9 pan.  Bake at 325 for 35 minutes.

Cool and then top with frosting.

Chocolate Fudge Frosting

• 1/4 cup butter
• 1/4 cup milk
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/2 bag chocolate chips (about 1 cup)
• 1 tsp vanilla

Bring butter, milk and sugar to a boil.  Remove from heat.

Add chocolate chips and vanilla.  Stir until smooth. 

Frost your cooled brownies and ENJOY!

Country Egg Scramble

I found this on the real mom kitchen site a while back and hadn't had a chance to try it!

This was a yummy hearty breakfast Wednesday meal for our family.  We ate this with Blueberry Muffins!  YUM!

Simple and yummy and was a hit with all!

Country Egg Scramble

(realmomkitchen)

• 6-7 medium sized red potatoes, cubed (I just used baking potatoes that I had on hand and guesstimated the size!  You can't really go wrong!)
• 8 eggs
• 1/3 cup milk
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/8 tsp pepper
• 4 medium green onions, sliced about 1/4 cup (left these out since I didn't have any)
• 6 slices bacon
• 1 cup cheese, whatever you have on hand should work

First off you need to cook your cubed potatoes.  So fill your pot with enough water to cover your potatoes and heat to boiling.  Then cook until your potatoes are tender, but not falling apart!

Beat your eggs, milk, salt and pepper with a fork or wire whisk.  Beat them until the egg mixture is a uniform yellow color.

In a large skillet, cook your 6 slices of bacon until crispy and then remove from heat.  When you eventually have to crumble the bacon, I like to cut the bacon before I cook it with my kitchen scissors so it is already crumbled.  Place your cooked bacon on a paper towel lined plate to help drain some grease!

Next add your potatoes to the skillet and cook them in the bacon grease left in the pan.  If you think there is too much grease, drain a little but leave enough so you can brown up your potatoes.

Cook your potatoes in the grease until browned, turning occasionally.  Stir in your green onions if you are using them and cook 1 minute longer stirring constantly.

Pour your egg mixture into the skillet with the potatoes.  As the eggs begin to set on the bottom and side of the pan, gently lift cooked portions with your spatula so that thin, uncooked portions can now flow to the bottom.  Avoid constant stirring!

Cook 3-4 minutes or until eggs are thickened throughout, but still moist.  Dice up your bacon, or put your already crumbled bacon on top and then sprinkle with cheese!

Enjoy with a nice warm muffin!

Chocolate Chip Brownies

Chocolate Chip Brownies are yummy!

They don't need frosting either!

They are all gone, so sad!

Another great brownie and another yummy way to eat your daily chocolate serving! 

 Doesn't everyone have this in there diet!??

Chocolate Chip Brownies

(www.chocolatechocolatemorechocolate.blogspot.com)

• 4 large eggs
• 2 cups sugar
• 3/4 cup butter, melted
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 1 1/2 cups flour
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/3 cup cocoa
• 1 1/2 cups chocolate chips

Lightly beat your eggs.  I did this by hand too!  Add your sugar, butter and vanilla.  Stir this until all the butter is completely combined.  Meaning the butter will no longer separate from the mixture.

Sift together the flour, cocoa, baking powder, and salt.  I did sift this together.

Add your flour mixture in thirds to your wet mixture.  This makes it much easier to mix this together by hand.  Mix just until blended.  Fold in your chocolate chips.

Pour into a greased 9 x 13 pan.  The recipe says to flour your pan, I didn't and they came out fine, but do what you think :)!

Spread your batter to the edges of your pan.  Bake 350 degrees for 30-35 minutes.  Let cool in your pan and enjoy, really enjoy! 

(I found out later that the rest of the brownies were thoroughly enjoyed with ice-cream, sliced strawberries and chocolate sauce on top!  YUMMM!)

How to make Homemade Croutons

So with baseball and we just ended soccer, dinners have become more interesting and rushed! 

I was thinking that I didn't want another night of whatever we could find in the freezer, so I put together a chef salad!

The only thing missing was croutons to make it really good!  I was planning to go to the store, but thought all I need is croutons and if I go to the store I will buy...you know what I mean!

So I went to the trusty Internet and decided why can't I make them!  Needless to say there are many recipes for them and they are truly better than the store bought version and they were simple too!

So, we will be making croutons at our house from now on and I will double the amount next time because they were all eaten.  In fact I couldn't keep hands off them as they cooled on the baking sheet before dinner even started!

So as we head into summer, make a big batch of croutons (and don't go buying them at the store :) one day and eat salad all week! YUMMMMMMMMMM!

How to make homemade croutons

(From gimmesomeoven.com)

• loaf of quality bread, cut into about 1-inch cubes (I used sour dough bread I had)  ~ preferably the loaf to be a day or two old
• about 1/4 cup olive oil
• salt and pepper
• seasonings ~ Italian seasoning, garlic powder, onion powder, Parmesan cheese

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

In a large bowl, put your bread cubes.  Now evenly drizzle your olive oil on top.  I didn't measure my olive oil, I just drizzled and tossed together until it looked evenly coated.  Season with salt and pepper and add your additional seasonings as desired.  I seasoned mine with garlic powder.

Toss again making sure all seasoning are evenly distributed.

Spread your bread cubes in a single layer on a baking sheet.  Bake until golden brown, turning the bread to brown on all sides.  Cooking time will depend on your bread thickness.  The recipe said she did it for 15-20 minutes, mine took longer by 10-15 minutes.  Watch carefully though, you don't want burnt croutons!

Remove when done from oven and let them cool completely on the pan.  Try to keep any taste tasters at bay!  It may be hard because the smell was so enticing and it traveled throughout the house!!

Store any leftovers in an air tight container.  Use within a week or freeze for up to 6 months!

Variations:

• Season with a salad dressing instead of oil and herbs
• Bake in a toaster oven (for smaller amounts)
• Use different kinds of breads (rye, sandwich bread, etc.)

Potatoes Romanoff

I have now made these potatoes twice and this was the first picture able to get!  Why you ask??  Because they were gone before I could get a picture!  My family isn't so sure about taking time to take a picture before we eat and sometimes I try not to embarrass my family when we have other people over!

So here we have it and they were fabulous!  That was just the first word that came to mind!

These potatoes are easy and the ingredients are usually ones I have on hand!  The only thing to remember is that you cook the potatoes in advance!  I am sure you could probably cook the potatoes in the morning and then put it together in the evening, but part of the ease is that I put the kids to bed, put the potatoes in the oven, sat down and watched a movie and turned the oven off after an hour and I was done!  So easy! 

If you don't have air conditioning as we head into the summer months, you may want to save this for the fall or I guess you could cheat and use store bought hash browns??

Either way they were YUMMY!!

Potatoes Romanoff

(www.tastykitchen.com)

• 3 large baking potatoes (or I did about 6 medium potatoes)
• 3/4 cups minced shallots (I omitted this, due to I don't have shallots laying around my kitchen:)
• 2 1/2 cups grated white cheddar cheese (I just used regular cheddar since it was what I had)
• 2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp pepper
• 1 1/2 cups sour cream
• I added bacon bits to mine too!

First off, I want to say that this is super simple and you can adjust as you want.  I didn't even really measure the second time I made this because how to you mess up with potatoes, cheese and sour cream!

Bake your potatoes first.  Do this the night before.  Bake 425 til done or about 40-60 minutes depending on the size.  The recipe recommends to wrap them in foil.  I did this the first time, but not the second and they seemed fine both ways! 

Let potatoes cool to room temp and then put them in the refrigerator over night  or if you are like me and you forgot about them in the oven, let them sit there and then put them in the fridge in the morning :)!!

Now your potatoes are chilled, grate them, skins and all!  I used my large box grater or it was recommended to use a food processor.  Put your grated potatoes into a large bowl and sprinkle with the shallots, 1 3/4 cups of your cheese, salt and pepper.

Use your hands and gently toss this all together.  Make sure you don't compress or squish your potatoes.  Fold in the sour cream.  Transfer this into a 1 1/2 quart dish.  (I doubled this both times and a doubled recipe fits nicely in a 9 x 13 pan)

Sprinkle the remaining cheese on top.  Now you can sprinkle bacon bits on top too!

Bake at 350 degrees until the tops are golden brown.  About 30 minutes.  We put them under the broiler at the end to help brown up the cheese too!

Best ever Oatmeal Chocolate Chip (or Raisin) Cookies

Well these cookies have lived up to the title!  My family has absolutely loved them!  We have a disagreement going though about which is better ~ raisin or chocolate chip!!  We are even thinking to try craisin or craisin chocolate chip???

These cookies are soft and flavorful and really are a great oatmeal cookie!

Best ever oatmeal chocolate chip cookie

(found on a blog that I forgot to write down! OOPS!)

• 1 cup butter or margarine softened
• 3/4 cup brown sugar
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 2 cups flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 tsp cinnamon
• 3 cups quick oats (or I did 2 cups regular oats)
• 2 cups chocolate chips (or divide your dough and do 1 cup raisins and 1 cup chocolate chips)

OK, the original recipe says that these taste better mixed by hand!  I looked away at these directions and used my mixer!  So you decide. but the thought of mixing all this by hand wasn't happening!  Just remember, we thought they were super good mixed in the mixer!

Mix your butter and sugars together.

Add in eggs, vanilla, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon.

Stir in your flour, then oats.  This is where I did do a little hand mixing.  I divided my dough in half and hand mixed in my raisins in one side and chocolate chips in the other half.  (If you find your raisins are hard, just soak them in warm water while you get the cookie dough made and it should soften them up!)

Bake at 375 degrees for 8-10 minutes.  They are done when they start turning golden brown in color.

Great on there own, with a glass of milk, or I really wanted to make an ice-cream sandwich with them!  YUM all 3 ways!

Ben's Birthday Cookies and Cupcake Cake

Since I am always looking for ideas when it comes to my kids birthday cakes, I thought I would post what I did for Ben's birthday!  I am by no means an expert, just a closet baker who enjoys trying new ideas!

 These are sugar cookies with just white icing and a food pen.  I won this set of food pens a long time ago and had never used them.  We went with a baseball theme, since Ben is in the middle of baseball right now. 

The pen worked really well, but best to use when the icing is wet and not completely set.  I was impressed and thought I would buy some again when they ran out!

I saw this on pinterest (I know so 2012 to be saying found on pinterest!!) and I will say it was easy and so fun to make a cupcake cake!  This was my first attempt and I am sure next time it will look better and more filled in, but I thought it wasn't too bad! 

Here is the frosting recipe I used!  It was super good!!

• 1 cup room temperature butter
• 3 cups powdered sugar
• 1/2 cup cocoa powder
• 4 tbsp heavy cream (or I used whipping cream since it was what I had)

Whip all this together and adjust the powdered sugar or cream to get the desired consistency and spread away!  Save your leftovers and spread it between 2 graham crackers!  A total childhood memory I can't get over and recreate whenever I can!  YUMMY!!!