Gorilla Bread

I know Christmas is not for another seven months, but Jeremy posted this on his blog and I wanted to share the recipe with everyone.  I think I first started making this our first Christmas as a married couple, in 2008.  I was searching on the Food Network's website and found this.  It's a Paula Deen recipe and yes, the recipe calls for butter and sugar. 

So I decided to try out the recipe.  It's a little time consuming because you have cut up biscuit dough and cream cheese and wrap the dough around the little bits of cream cheese.  But it's definitely worth it!  I've made it now every Christmas morning since 2008.  I think it's a great little tradition.  But I also think I need to make it more than once a year! 

You will need a bundt pan for this recipe.

Ingredients

1/2 cup granulated sugar
3 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter
1 cup packed brown sugar
1 8-ounce package cream cheese
2 12-ounce cans refrigerated biscuits (10 count) (Note: I usually can only find packs of 8, so I just cut two in half to make 10)
1 1/2 cup coarsely chopped walnuts (optional)

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. 

• Spray a pan with nonstick cooking spray.  In a saucepan on low heat, melt the butter and brown sugar, stirring well and set aside.
• Mix the granulated sugar and cinnamon.  Cut the cream cheese into 20 equal cubes.  Press the biscuits out with your fingers and sprinkle each with 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon sugar.  Place a cube of cream cheese in the center of each biscuit, wrapping and sealing the dough around the cream cheese. 
• Sprinkle 1/2 cup of the nuts into the bottom of the bundt pan (optional). 
• Place 10 prepared biscuits in the pan.  Sprinkle with cinnamon sugar, pour half of the melted butter mixture over the biscuits, and sprinkle on 1/2 cup of nuts, if using. 
• Layer the remaining biscuits on top, sprinkle with the remaining cinnamon sugar, pour the remaining butter mixture over the biscuits, and sprinkle with the remaining 1/2 cup of nuts, if using. 
• Bake for 30 minutes.  Remove from the oven and cool for 5 minutes.  Place a plate on top of the bundt pan and flip over.
• Enjoy!

Let me know if you try this recipe.  If you look on Paula Deen's website, she has different variations that look just as amazing!

Applesauce!

A few weeks ago, I went apple picking with Jeremy and my sister, Amy.  We picked over 60 pounds of apples and our (well...Amy and I) goal was to make applesauce, can it, and give it as Christmas gifts.  We went to Pochuck Valley Farm in Glenwood, NJ and picked as many apples as we could stuff into the three bags we bought.  I'm not really sure what types of apples we picked, but we had a mixture of both green and red types.

After picking over 60 pounds of apples, we went back to my mom's house to start making the applesauce.  Amy has fruit and vegetable strainer for her KitchenAid mixer.  This is the best thing to have if you are making tons of applesauce!  All we had to do was cut up the apples and cook them down before sending them through the strainer.  The strainer does all the hard work.  It separates the seeds and stems from the sauce.  A bowl catches all the apple sauce (see the pictures at the beginning of this post).

Once we had enough applesacue to fill some canning jars, we put the sauce on the stove and let it boil for a few minutes.  Once it was boiling, we put the sauce in the jars and placed the jars in boiling water for 15 minutes.  You can find the instructions on canning applesauce here.

In case you were wondering...60 pounds of apples produces over 20 quarts of applesauce!  We canned most of the sauce, but froze two large batches to serve at Thanksgiving. 

Check out the large, silver stockpot behind us.  It's filled to the top with applesauce!

Cinnamon Swirl Quick Bread

Here is a simple recipe for a yummy cinnamon swirl bread.  I made this for breakfast the other weekend, and it was delicious!

Cinnamon Swirl:

1/3 c. sugar

2 tsp. cinnamon

Bread:

2 c. flour

1 c. sugar

1 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salt

1 egg

1 c. milk

1/3 c. vegetable oil

Directions:

(1)  Preheat oven 350 degrees Fahrenheit.  Grease and flour a 9x13 loaf pan.

(2)  Combine the cinnamon swirl ingredients in a small bowl and set aside.

(3)  Prepare the bread - mix together the dry ingredients in a bowl.

(4)  In another bowl, beat together the egg, milk and oil.  Combine with the flour mixture until moistened.  It's okay if the batter is a little lumpy.

(5)  Pour half of the batter into the loaf pan and sprinkle with half of the cinnamon mixture.  Pour the remaining batter on top and sprinkle with the rest of the cinnamon mixture.  Using a knife, swirl the cinnamon mixture with the batter.

(6)  Bake for 40 to 45 minutes, until toothpick comes out clean.

(7)  Cool in pan for a few minutes.  Remove from pan and allow to cool on a cooling rack. 

(8)  Slice and enjoy!