St. Patrick’s Day – Fun Foods

St. Patrick’s Day is tomorrow!  I love this holiday for all the fun foods!  I have been browsing pinterest and food blogs for fun green food ideas as well as other festive ideas.  Here are some of my favorites; click the picture to go to the recipe!

1. Crab Stuffed Baked Avocado – Domestic Fits

2.Cucumber Cups Stuffed with Spicy Crab – Domestic Fits

3. Lucky Leprechaun Hats – Betty Crocker

4. Ligurian Pesto with Spaghetti – Bon Appétit

5. Cheddar Biscuits – Kraft Foods

6. Irish Cheesecake – Kraft Foods

7. Irish Car Bomb Cupcakes – Brown Eyed Baker

8. Grilled Corned Beef and Fontina Sandwiches – Bon Appétit

9.Green Eggs and Ham – Martha Stewart

10.Vegetarian Split Pea Soup – The Curvy Carrot

11. Monster Veggie Burger – Shape Magazine: Healthy Eating

12. No Bake Mini Grasshopper Pies – A Pretty Life In The Suburbs

13. Mrs. O’Callaghan’s Soda Bread – Bon Appétit

Hope these pictures and recipes gave you some ideas for your St. Patrick’s Day food festivities!

Berry Cheesecake Bars

Happy Cheesecake Day!  I’ve had this tasty recipe for ages, and today was the perfect day to share it with you all!  I’m not a huge cheesecake fan, but these bars are the perfect size for me.  Plus the raspberries make it delightful!  I also have a feeling that Gary might not be able to resist these little morsels since they have just about everything he could want in a dessert. I cut my version in half since I am going on vacation again soon.  I didn’t want to share too many.  Just call me selfish when it comes to tasty treats!

Makes: About 24 Bars

Ingredients (Full Recipe):

Crust:

18 Graham Cracker Boards – Crushed

• Variation: Use Chocolate Graham Crackers

1/4 Cup  Sugar

3/4 Cup  (1 1/2 sticks) Unsalted Butter – Melted

Swirl:

1/2 Pint Fresh Raspberries

2 Teaspoons Sugar

Filling:

32 Ounces Cream Cheese – Softened

1 Cup Sugar

3 Large Eggs

1 Tablespoon Lemon Juice

1 Teaspoon Vanilla Extract

• I didn’t have enough vanilla, so I used raspberry extract instead.

Directions:

1. Crush graham crackers.

2. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.  Line a 13 x 9 x 2 inch baking pan with foil.

3. In a bowl mix crushed crackers, butter, and sugar.  Press mixture into the bottom of the pan.

4. Bake for 7 minutes or until slightly dry but still soft.

5. Set aside 1/2 cup of raspberries.

6. Put the remaining raspberries in a bowl with the 2 teaspoons of sugar and beat with a mixer until the berries are not longer together and most parts of the berry have been smashed.

• Instead of using a mixer a blender will work as well.  Use the puree setting if you choose this method.

7. Strain seeds and solid parts.  You should be left with about 1/4 cup of raspberry juice. Set aside for later use.

8. In a large bowl beat softened cream cheese until smooth.  Beat in sugar, eggs, vanilla, and juice.

9. In a medium bowl pour in 2 cups of the cream cheese mixture.  Mix in raspberry juice.

10. Dot the graham cracker crust with remaining raspberries.

11. Dollop both batters into the pan.  Swirl with a knife or spoon to swirl.

12. Bake at 350 degrees for 35 minutes.  Cool slightly after removing from the oven.

13.  Refrigerate until cold.  Cut into bars.

• Store bars in the fridge until ready to eat.

* If you want another recipe check out the cheesecake my sister made!

**As I re-read the ingredients I realized that I used only a quarter of the cream cheese and should have used an additional 8 ounces.  That is why the full raspberry is visible above the cheesecake layer.  This is just another reminder that I need to make sure to read the recipe twice and to actually read not skim.

Family Sharing – Little Cheesecakes with Strawberry Sauce

I come from a very food creative family and the other day I had a thought, what if my family shared on my blog some of their delectable delights?  Wonderful idea!  This will be the first family posting!  This delicious dessert was made by my sister, Emily, from this cookbook (pg.  198).  She made this cheesecake for our grandpa for father’s day.  This father’s day posting is a little late because grandma and grandpa were having a fun time camping.

Emily – Lil Sister

Servings: 6          Time: 2.5 Hours

Ingredients:

-Cheesecake

10 Chocolate Graham Crackers – Broken (Emily: But I had to use regular ones because Mom forgot to buy the right ones!)

1/4 C. Semisweet Chocolate Chips

3 Tbsp Unsalted Butter – Melted

1 Pound Cream Cheese – Softened

3/4 C. Sugar

2 Large Eggs – Room Temperature

2 Tsp Pure Vanilla Extract

1 Tsp Grated Orange Zest (Optional)

-Sauce

1 C. Frozen Strawberries – Thawed

2 Tbsp Sugar

Directions:

-Cheesecake

1. Microwave cream cheese on HIGH for 15 seconds to bring to room temperature.  To bring the eggs to room temperature put the eggs in a bowl of warm water.

2. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.  Process the graham crackers and chocolate in a food processor until finely ground.

3. Add the butter and pulse until mixture is sandy and moist.

4. Divide the mixture evenly amount 6 Jumbo muffin tins.  Press evenly over the bottom and up the sides about 2/3 of the way.

• Emily: I didn’t have jumbo muffin tins, so I put the crumb mixture into a regular muffin tin and one shallow pie tin.  I did 6 muffin cups and one little pie.
• Me: This is cool because you can create whichever size you want, especially if you don’t have the specific bakeware required.

5. Bake until the crusts are set.  About 8 minutes.

6. Clean the food processor and then pulse the cream cheese, sugar, eggs, vanilla, and orange zest until smooth.

• Me: You need to clean the food processor because you don’t want graham crackers in your cream cheese!

7. Divide the filling between the muffin cups and bake until the rims are slightly puffed and the centers are set. About 30 minutes.

8. Cool the cheesecakes in the cups on a cooling rack, then refrigerate, uncovered, for at least 2 hours.

-Sauce

1. In a food processor (clean again) or a blender puree the strawberries with the sugar.

-Final Product

1. When you are ready to serve, gently run a knife along the edge of the cheesecake to loosen it from the mold.  Using the knife gently life the cheesecake from the mold.

2. Transfer cheesecakes to your serving dishes.  Spoon some sauce over each cake and Enjoy!

**Tip from the cookbook: To check for doneness, shake the pan a little.  Cheesecake is almost set when the center still shimmy’s just a little.  If they crack, take them out.  You can cover any cracks with the sauce.

Emily: Hi, I’m Emily, Jessica’s younger sister, and our family is very creative not just with food but also with other things and ideas. Jessica is more of our “baker” although I bake too, the only difference is that I am definitely not into it as much as she is (ugh, the cleaning haha). Like all sisters we have our (major) differences and yet we still come together to do things we love, like baking. This is especially true when we bake during Christmas time with our mom and make a ton of cookies. Jess always makes it fun and exciting. 🙂

Me: I hope you all enjoy the recipes that will be shared by my family and enjoy this super tasty cheesecake!