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Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Banana Nutella Wontons - by Lisa

I really don't think you can ever go wrong with Nutella anything. :) Of course when I spotted this recipe, I knew I'd be excited about making it!

In shopping for the (very few) ingredients I needed, I was a little apprehensive about finding the wonton wrappers. But my worry was in vain as they were at the first store I tried! The only tricky thing is that they were located in the "natural" food cooler with all the gluten-free/tofu/super-organic items. I never would've thought to look there. :P

Generally speaking, this is a VERY simple recipe. It's more of an assembly process than anything else. But it is a bit time consuming. I ended up with 17 wontons (that simultaneously filled the pan and used up one banana), but it took me a good 30-45 min to put them together. I never did really figure out quite the right method for placing the filling on the wrapper, but it certainly didn't hurt the end product.

Pre-oven

They were supposed to bake for 8-10 min, but I wound up baking them for about 2.5 min longer to try and get them a little more browned. I'm not sure if I over baked them or not, but they weren't quite as crisp as I'd expected. The wrappers were kind of a hard chewy texture. But the mix of cinnamon sugar with the butter combined with the filling was super yummy!!! I wasted no time in gobbling up four of them! I can also totally see why these need to be consumed very shortly after coming out of the oven! :)

I've still got more wonton wrappers, bananas and Nutella, so I'll probably make some more this weekend. Maybe I'll change they baking time a little and see what happens. :)

Saturday, April 24, 2010

Sour Cream Coffee Cake - by Summer


I'm back to baking and it sure does feel good!  Just even a week ago, I couldn't imagine finding the time to bake without a baby permanently attached to me, but as they say, babies sure do change quickly.

I am glad we started back with this recipe.  I completely agree with Lisa - it was easy and very, very tasty!  I followed the recipe exactly and it baked perfectly in 45 minutes.  I made this on Thursday, but we didn't eat it until Friday.  We had some friends over (they have a baby 3 days younger than ours!) and everyone agree that it was delicious!  

I ended up making the glaze just before serving on Friday.  I ended up using more milk than the recipe called for to make it more glaze-like.  In the future, I think I would use even more milk to make it a little be more runny.

I actually plan on making this again next weekend when my parents are in town.  It's so easy and looks impressive with the cinnamon swirl in the middle.

Monday, April 19, 2010

Sour Cream Coffee Cake - by Lisa

And...we are BACK! :) After a brief hiatus for new mommy Summer, we now return you to your regularly scheduled baking blog.

In my opinion, we picked a delicious recipe to get us back in the groove. I have always loved me some coffee cake despite my non-coffee drinking ways. This cake definitely does not disappoint! Please don't mind the crumbs as I scarf down my 2nd piece.

This is a simple and straightforward recipe. I also had all of the ingredients on hand except for the sour cream. To me, those things combined means it is a good recipe to keep in my back pocket for a future emergency dessert or to simply satisfy a craving.

I even felt comfortable enough with this recipe that I allowed some "help" in the form of my two year old son, Caiden. He was super excited to be a part of the process!

I don't even really have any notes of my own to add for this one, though I will say there were zero disasters with the bundt pan (another story for another day). Woo hoo! I absolutely loved the cinnamon swirl that runs thru the cake, and the cinnamon sugar glaze is the perfect finishing touch. The cake was done in exactly 45 minutes, and after cooling for a few minutes, it popped out of the pan with ease.

The yummy fragrance was driving me mad, but I made myself wait to try it until after dinner. Tho I couldn't wait long enough for hubby to come downstairs to get a piece before diving right in! :)