Secret Spaghetti

You will never guess the secret ingredient in this sauce.

The Help put in his 2 cents and said this would go well with andouille sausage.  I wouldn't know because I don't particularly care for sausage.

Miso Spaghetti

     2 tbsp olive oil

     2 c chopped celery

     2 c chopped bell pepper

     1 clove garlic, minced

     3 large tomatoes, seeded and chopped (about 4 cups)

     2 tbsp honey

     2 tsp fresh oregano leaves

     2 tsp pesto or basil

     1/4 c white miso

     1/2 c chopped nuts

     1 lb strand-type pasta

     shredded parmesan cheese

Heat oil in a large skillet or medium saucepan.  Saute celery, bell pepper, and garlic for 10 minutes.  Add tomatoes, honey, oregano and pesto or basil.  Simmer for 30 minutes.  Add miso and nuts.  Serve over pasta and top with shredded parmesan cheese.

Thanksgiving Memories: Pumpkin Crunch Cake

I didn't do much this past Thanksgiving, but I had a great day.  The Help picked up a ready-to-heat turkey meal from Foodland, which was unbelievably delicious.  Now I'm thinking that given the sheer ease of throwing a meal like that together, its just unbelievably time-consuming (and not exponentially better tasting) to make your own food.  One thing we both enjoyed was the absence of the mound of oily dishes from roasting the bird and cooking all the trimmings.

The dessert which came with the meal was a small pumpkin pie.  While I'm not against pumpkin, I am definitely not a fan of pumpkin (and custard) pie.  I like the taste of the filling, but to me, pumpkin pie is so boring.  In the past, I've made a few kick-ass pumpkin desserts (fresh pumpkin cake, pumpkin roll, pumpkin and cream cheese layered dessert), but I just didn't feel excited about eating any of those things this year.  The Help told me he saw a dessert at Moonstruck Patisserie called "Pumpkin Crunch", but when asked to describe what it was, The Help was at a loss for words.  But he insisted it sounded good.

In search of the perfect Pumpkin Crunch recipe, no easy task for someone who never tasted it, I looked through about a dozen cookbooks before I found one.  In fact, the identical recipe appeared in several cookbooks.  The universal appeal is that it uses whole-package amounts of purchased ingredients (8 oz. Cool Whip, 8 oz. cream cheese, etc.).  A few recipes called for odd amounts of these ingredients.  I mean, really, what would I do with an 8 oz. container of Cool Whip after a cup of it has been removed?

To make a long story short, Pumpkin Crunch Cake (not really a cake in my book, and, I'm sure Melissa would agree. . .I KNOW cake), was a huge hit, in spite of it being unknown in my home before November.  Then my friend Harvey told me its one of his favorite desserts.  A few days later, I tried to get cousin Kent to take some home (when he came for a consultation to look at D1's bruised black big toe), but he politely declined and said he and his wife had been eating it for over five days past Thanksgiving.

click on recipe title for printable recipe
Pumpkin Crunch Cake

     1 can (29 oz) pumpkin

     1 can (13 oz) evaporated milk

     1 c sugar

     3 eggs

     1 tsp cinnamon

     1 box (abut 18 oz) Duncan Hines yellow cake mix*

     1 c pecans, chopped

     1 c butter, melted

     8 oz cream cheese, softened

     8 oz Cool Whip

     1 c sifted powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Grease a 9 x 13" pan, and line the bottom with parchment or waxed paper.  Grease paper.  In a large mixing bowl, combine pumpkin, evaporated milk, sugar, eggs, and cinnamon.  Pour into prepared pan.  Sprinkle dry cake mix over pumpkin mixture.  Sprinkle nuts evenly over cake mix.  Carefully pour melted butter over nuts and cake mix.  Bake for 1 hour.  When completely cool, invert pan over serving tray.  Peel off paper.  Combine cream cheese, Cool Whip and powdered sugar.  Beat with mixer until well combined.  Frost top (pumpkin layer) of cake.  Store in refrigerator.

*If you are using a new cake mix with less than 18 oz (about 15 oz.), add 6 tbsp flour to cake mix before proceeding with recipe.

Flexible Fruity Nutty Bars

I'm feeling a little melancholy today.  D1 left for Japan this morning with the Key Club, and D2 is still under the weather with a lingering virus (low fever, listless, grouchy).  I'm still stuck at an assessment workshop.  With 45 minutes for lunch, we pretty much have no choice but to eat lunch at Sky Garden.  I like the Chinese food at Sky Garden, but lunch gets a little tiresome day after day.  Sky Garden offers a buffet lunch also, but the price is steep, and 45 minutes would not allow me nearly enough time to consume my share.  With the vacation looming, I'm going to make a pan of these bars to help lift my spirits.

This is one of those recipes which began as an innocent date bar recipe but has morphed into many other things.  Lets start at the beginning.  When I was pregnant with D2, my ob-gyn visits entailed a detour to Jilly's, a snack shop on the ground floor of the medical building.  Without fail, I'd buy a 2-pack of date bars.  The bars had a buttery shortbread crust and a heavy, cakey, nutty, sweet topping.  I know I didn't taste dates, but it didn't matter because it was good, satisfied my sweet tooth, and sent me down the path towards gestational diabetes.  Imua!

Mom would often buy fresh dates from Costco and tell me to make date bars.  I was happy to oblige, but eventually the dates disappeared.  Left only with a partial tin of glaceed apricots from Williams-Sonoma, I decided to take a risk and experiment with them by replacing the dates with glaceed apricots.  The result was fabulous.  This led me to try other fruits:  dried mango, dried apricots (not the expensive glaceed type), dried peaches.  All were good.  Then I tried substituting macadamia nuts for pecans (I don't eat walnuts).  All good again.

But now I had an even bigger problem on my hands.  The 7"x11" pan I was using provided hardly enough bars to take anywhere.  It barely fed me!  I knew I had to somehow develop a recipe that could be made in a 9"x13" pan, which would definitely be enough for me to eat my fill AND take some to an event.  The crust was easy, but I had to do some tinkering with the brown sugar amount before I got the filling right.  The first few results were sickingly sweet, but I think its perfect now.

Some great fruit-nut combinations are:  apricot-pecan, mango-macadamia, dates-pecan, peach/pineapple-pecan.  The pics on this blog happen to be peach/pineapple-pecan.  Those are tried and true, but feel free to experiment with your own combos.  As a caution to anyone who makes this . . . be prepared to give out the recipe.  Everytime I've taken this somewhere (work potluck) or served it at home (Colleen & Flo), someone ALWAYS asks for the recipe.

click on recipe title for printable recipe
Flexible Fruity Nutty Bars

Crust:  1 c butter

           1/2 c sugar

           2 c flour

Mix butter, sugar and flour until crumbly.  Press evenly into a 9 x 13" pan.  Bake at 400 degrees for 12 minutes.  While crust is baking, make filling.

Filling:  2/3 c flour

            1 tsp baking powder

            1/2 tsp salt

            4 eggs

            1 1/2 c brown sugar

            1 c chopped dried fruit

            2 tsp vanilla

            1 c chopped nuts

Mix together flour, baking powder, and salt.  Set aside.  Beat eggs and add brown sugar and dried fruit.  Add flour mixture, vanilla, and nuts.  Spread evenly over hot crust.  Reduce oven temperature to 350 degrees.  Bake for 30 minutes.  Let cool for 10 minutes before cutting into squares or bars.  When completely cool, dust generously with powdered sugar and remove cut pieces from pan.