Pork Fried Rice

I am a major jerk and didn't get a picture of this, sorry. Also, while I'm insulting myself, I am a total weirdo because I made this along side a Greek Meatloaf. I wanted to tackle both recipes while I had the ingredients. They didn't go together at all, but separately they were both dynamite. I always eat my fried rice at Chinese restaurants with "duck sauce" which in case you haven't had it, is this delicious sweet and sour type of sauce. I of course don't have any duck sauce at my house. I researched how to make it and was disappointed to know I needed plum, peach or apricot preserves, which I didn't have. So, I used teriyaki sauce in addition to soy sauce, rather than all soy, to still get my sweet need taken care of. Good move on my part, just sayin! Hope you all agree.

1 lb pork, diced
1/2 cup chopped onion
1/2 cup chopped green pepper
3 tbsp vegetable oil
3 cups rice, fully cooked
2 eggs, beaten
2 tbsp teriyaki sauce
1 tbsp soy sauce
1/8 tsp ground ginger

In a large skillet, sautee pork, onion and green pepper in oil until pork is fully cooked. Add in rice and allow to cook for 3-5 minutes. In a mixing bowl, combine eggs, teriyaki, soy sauce and ground ginger. Pour into rice mixture and allow to cook for 3-5 minutes.

Shrimp Carbonara

I have always wanted to successfully pull off a carbonara dish. I was in the grocery store the other day and was completely uninspired to pick out ingredients that would actually come together to make anything decent. I picked pork, bacon, marscarpone cheese, shrimp, and milk hoping that one of these ingredients would be useful by the time I got to my stove. It ended up that the bacon, marscarpone and shrimp inspired me to make a Shrimp Carbonara. It came out so creamy and delicious and was relatively easy to make. I know the picture isn't the greatest, but I couldn't wait any longer to dive right in. The smell of bacon and garlic coming from my stove were killing me. I hope you all like it too!

1 lb pasta
2 tbsp butter
6 slices bacon
1/4 tsp oregano
5 cloves garlic
1 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup marscarpone cheese
2 egg yolks, lightly beaten
1/2 cup parmesan cheese, grated
1/2 cup romano cheese, grated
Salt & Pepper to taste
1 lb shrimp, fully cooked and diced

Cook pasta as directed on box.

In a medium saucepan, cook bacon in butter until crispy. Reduce heat to medium and add garlic. Cook garlic for 2-3 minutes. Whisk in heavy cream and marscarpone cheese. In a small mixing bowl, combine yolks, parmesan and romano. Add a spoonful of cream sauce to egg mixture to warm the eggs. Stir egg mixture into rest of cream mixture until well combined. Add in shrimp and allow to heat through for 2-3 minutes. Toss with pasta and serve with additional grated parmesan if desired.

YONANAS!

OK, I've been a majorly absent blogger and I'm so sorry. I feel like I've been so busy but I look back over the past month and wonder what it is that has kept me so busy. I do have a bunch of titled posts saved with recipe ideas, but haven't had time to throw it together. The times I have had to cook, I've been cooking my go-to meals that I know without having to think too much about it.

I did want to do a quick blog about an amazing appliance I found while reading Family Circle magazine. (Clearly I'm not the average 24 year old.) It is called YONANAS! The name is ridiculous but the concept is awesome.

You basically just shove frozen fruit into it and it turns it into soft-serve. Talk about a creative way to get your daily fruits. I am a huge ice cream lover and I am so excited to replace the billion calorie treat with this!

Anyways, I just wanted to share my discovery with you guys because I think its awesome. They sell it at Target. I promise I'll be back soon with some good recipes to make up for my absence. Love you all! <3

Strawberry Shortcake French Toast

So one of my good friends had a birthday party recently and I made Strawberry Shortcake for the event. I used a recipe from my go-to dessert diva, Paula Deen. It was out of this world. I made a couple changes and used the leftovers to build some spectacular french toast.


12-14 slices of bread, depending upon thickness
2 cups milk
4 eggs, beaten
1/2 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tbsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg

1 8 oz package cream cheese, softened

1 14oz can sweetened condensed milk

2 cups whipped cream

3 cups strawberries, diced

1 cup sugar

1 cup water

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Coat griddle or skillet with butter or cooking spray and heat to medium. Mix milk, eggs, flour, sugar, vanilla extract, ground cinnamon and nutmeg together in large mixing bowl. Turn each slice of bread to coat in batter and transfer to skillet. Cook toast to golden brown and transfer to baking sheet in oven to keep warm while remaining cook.

While bread is cooking, beat together cream cheese and sweetened condensed milk until well combined. Fold in whipped cream gently.

In a mixing bowl, turn strawberries, sugar and water together.

Spread cream cheese mixture on one slice of toast, top with strawberry mixture and another slice of toast. Top with extra whipped cream if desired. 

Red Velvet Cake

Ok, so first I'd like to apologize for my absense. I've had a stupid cold for over a week now and haven't felt like standing, never mind testing out new recipes. I got back in the kitchen today and tested out a recipe for Red Velvet Cake and it came out perfect! I was so pumped. I was really nervous the cake would be dry but it was perfect!

Next, I'd like to apologize for the lack of picture. I had leftover frosting from some cupcakes I made last week. However, the frosting was purple and I just couldn't bring myself to put a mismatched cake + frosting combo up here. I will be making this in the future and hopefully I'll remember to update it with a picture when I make it with normal white frosting.

Cake:
1/4 cup shortening
1/2 cup oil
1 1/2 cup granulated sugar
2 eggs
1/4 cup cocoa
2 oz red food coloring
1 cup buttermilk
1 tsp salt
1 tbsp vanilla extract
1 tsp almond extract
2 3/4 cups sifted all purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tbsp distilled white vinegar

Frosting:
4 oz cream cheese, room temperature
1 stick butter, room temperature
4 cups powdered sugar
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp almond extract
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease two 9 inch pans.

Using an electric mixer, beat shortening, oil and sugar together until well combined. Beat in eggs one at a time.

In a separate bowl, mix together cocoa and food coloring. Add in to shortening mixture.

In another bowl, mix together buttermilk, salt, vanilla, and almond extract. Add into mixture 1/2 cup at a time, alternating with adding 1/2 cup flour at a time.

Next, mix together baking soda and vinegar. Fold into batter. Do not beat into mixture, gently fold it in. Pour into prepared cake pans and bake for 30 minutes.

Beat together cream cheese, butter and sugar with electric mixer. Add in powdered sugar one cup at a time until well combined and no clumps. Add in vanilla and almond extracts.
Allow cake to fully cool and frost cake.

Lovely Blogger Award

Not gonna lie, I feel pretty special because Casey nominated me as a Lovely Blogger. :)

By accepting this award you promise to do the following:
1. Post linking back to the person that gave you the award
2. Share 7 random things about yourself
3. Award 15 recently discovered blogs.
4. Drop them a note and tell them about it

7 Random Facts about meeee!

1. My favorite way to eat popcorn is with melted butter and granulated garlic. Sometimes if I'm feeling extra fancy, I even add some parmesan cheese. :O

2. I don't like peanut butter AT ALL. However, my all time favorite candy is Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. Yeah, I don't really get it either.

3. My Cousin Vinny is my favorite movie. I do a killer impression of the part where Marissa Tomei flips out about the deer.

4. I have recently gotten into the show Army Wives and I'd have to say it ranks in my top 5 all time favorite shows already.

5. I suck at flipping pancakes.

6. I sometimes spend hours playing Sims 3. Kind of ridiculous on my part.

7. I would love to own a sailboat.

Now the hard part, 15 blogs to recommend...

align my heart, my body, my mind
absense is to love as wind is to fire
Evil Shenanigans
For the Love of Cooking
Grilled Cheese Social
Lauren's Kitchen
Lucy's Cards
Running Mama Cooks
Stephanie Cooks

Okay, so I only came up with 9 :( Please people, leave comments with good blogs or email me- cookingwithcait@gmail.com. I'd love to beef up my gReader with some cooking, photography and craft type blogs! HELP!

Oreo Cookie Truffles

I've made these bad boys before but never posted the recipe. I decided I would make them again since 1) they're delicious and 2) I wanted to share them with you all.

So, I went to work in the kitchen, whipped together the filling then took the time to dip all 30+ of the little guys into the melted chocolate. I recruited Jon to help and asked him to sprinkle some crushed oreos on top of them. To him sprinkling apparently equals dumping so they ended up with more garnish than I anticipated, not going to complain about extra oreo that's for sure. Then, I placed them on a plate covered with wax paper and stuck them in the fridge. I went back in the fridge because after sneaking a few of them, I needed some milk. So, I grabbed out the milk which my genius arse had used as a support for the plate (real smart Cait) which of course caused the plate to flip over and fall onto the floor into a big chocolate blob. Now, most of the time when accidents like these happen in our house, Jon is somehow to blame. I was so angry with myself that I swear if he even chuckled or looked at me sideways, I would've flown off the handle, haha. So I marched out of the kitchen without saying a word, or closing the fridge. I came back into the kitchen to him cleaning up my mess for me and then I finally just busted out in laughter. Once I started laughing, he admitted that he had been sitting there trying to figure out if he was to blame somehow. It ended up being a comical waste of time. I feel like someone upstairs is as concerned with my waist line as I am. Luckily, I did snap a picture for you guys before the destruction. I hope that you don't have a disaster on your hands when you make them because with all the work of dipping them, it is really nice to actually be able to eat them afterwards.

1 box oreos
8 oz cream cheese, softened
11 oz bag chocolate chips

Using a food processor, pulse oreo cookies until fine. (You could also just throw them in a Ziploc bag and beat them senseless with a rolling pin.) Using an electric mixer, beat cream cheese in medium mixing bowl until smooth. Beat in cookie crumbs. Place mixture in fridge for about one hour to set. Once set and hard enough to handle, use a spoon to scoop out and shape into bite sized balls.

Use a double boiler or microwave to melt chocolate chips. Using a fork or slotted spoon, dip each ball into chocolate until fully covered. Place on baking sheet lined with wax paper and set in refrigerator until chocolate hardens.