Lemon Cornmeal Cake

These lemon cakes would be perfect to serve at a party or just to your family for dessert. I found this recipe in a Woman's Day magazine from March in 2009. Seeing these will make you wish that dessert came first!  This recipe yielded 12 miniature bundt cakes.  If you make this recipe in a regular bundt pan you can reduce by half the amount of sugar glaze you use.

This is my Foodie Friday Entry at Designs By Gollum.  You can see other wonderful food at Foodie Friday here:

Ingredients:

Baking spray(cooking spray with flour)

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 cup yellow cornmeal

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, softened

1 3/4 cups sugar

1 tablespoon grated lemon zest

1/4 cup lemon juice

4 large eggs

1 cup buttermilk or plain yogurt, stirred to loosen

Sugar Glaze:

2 cups sugar

2/3 cup lemon juice

Heat oven to 325 degrees. You'll need a miniature bundt cake pan coated with baking spray. In medium bowl, whisk together flour, cornmeal, baking powder and soda, and salt. 

In a large bowl, beat butter, sugar, lemon zest and juice with mixer on medium speed until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs one at a time until blended. With mixer on low, alternately beat in flour mixture and buttermilk until batter is smooth. Scrape into prepared pan; level top with spatula.

                               

                             

Bake approximately 20 minutes (if using mini pans and 45-50 minutes if using regular pan) until a wooden pick inserted in cakes comes out clean. Cool cake in pan on wire rack for 5 minutes.

Meanwhile make the sugar glaze:

Whisk glaze ingredients in a small bowl just until combined (sugar will not be totally dissolved). Invert cakes from pan onto rack; place rack over a baking sheet. Brush glaze all over hot cakes until absorbed (sugar crystals will be evident). Cool completely. Transfer cakes to a serving plate and cover. Let cakes rest several hours or overnight, before serving. Store cake covered at room temperature up to 4 days.

You could also use lime zest and juice instead of lemon!

Oooohhhh! Look at that amazing yellow lemon heaven!

Bon-Appetit!

J is for Jelly Beans and the Jelly Belly Factory!

I am a sucker for Jelly Beans, especially Jelly Bellys! When I was six I went to the Jelly Belly factory in Fairfield California! It was AMAZING! But the thing that I remember most about it was the giant picture made out of jelly beans! That was pretty cool, even though I don't really even remember what the picture was of, I think it might have been a person. Jelly Beans are really great!!!!!  Come join me at Jenny Matlock's Alphabe-Thursday.  You can link to it here:

This is a picture of my dad, my sister Talley, my brother Skyler, ME and my mom's friend Joan.

These are the citrus fruit Jelly Belly's and they are yummy!

Easter/Spring Tablescape!

Spring is here! And what does that mean? It means easter is on it's way! I love Easter...actually I love all the holidays, but Easter is a favorite of mine! I love the Easter egg hunts, and the easter bunny!(Although I used to be afraid of the ones at the Mall!) So I hope you like my Easter tablescape!

I'll soon be posting my recipe for lemon cornmeal cake!

Fable Haven!!

Today the fifth book of Fablehaven came out! I am on page 78 currently! It is already sucking me in..... I didn't even want to put it down to do this post! I am sooo obsessed with these books! My other book favorites are: Percy Jackson and The Olympians series, The Darkest Powers Series, and I also really like the book Ella Enchanted! Yipee for the author of Fablehaven.. Brandon Mull!!!!!

Cupcakes!

I really love cupcakes! They are so pretty! What kind of cupcake do you like? Here are some pics of some cupcakes I made just recently.

I love the pretty pink color!

Here's a frosting recipe of my Aunt Jackie's

 that you definitely HAVE to try!

In mixer, combine 3/4 cup butter, room temperature, 4 cups powdered sugar, 1 teaspoon clear vanilla or 1 teaspoon almond flavoring and 3-4 tablespoons water. Beat until fluffy. Add more water if needed 1 tablespoon at a time.

To make chocolate frosting add 1/4 to 1/3 cups cocoa powder. You may need to add a little more water. You can also add a little bit of  your favorite color food coloring.

Yummy!!!

Soooo Simple Meringues!

If you're bored on the weekend in the kitchen, and you get a craving for something sweet, these would be perfect! (Especially if you don't have many ingredients.) I made mine slightly green for St. Patrick's Day----if you can tell!!

I am posting this at Tasty Tuesdays and you can link up here:

I am also posting this at Tempt My Tummy Tuesday and you can link up here:

Ingredients:

4 egg whites

1 1/2 cups sugar

1/2 teaspoon mint extract

or, 1 tablespoon lime juice

 (I used mint for this recipe)

A dab of food coloring

 ( I used green for St. Patricks day) 

Beat Egg whites until stiff and glossy peaks form. Beat in sugar, adding a little bit at a time. Add the flavoring ( Lime or Mint) and the food coloring. Beat at medium speed for about 20 minutes.

 Heat the oven to 250 degrees. Grease, and lightly flour a cookie sheet or use parchment paper.  Put mixture in a decorator tube with a size one wide tip. Push out mixture into globs that are about 1 1/2 inches wide. Bake for about 15-20 minutes, or until you see only the very first hint of browning on the top or bottom edges of the cookies. Cool the finished cookies for about 1 hour on the pan.  They will only expand only a little bit, so they will not need to spaced out a lot. Make sure you beat the mixture for 20 minutes before baking, or the cookies will not turn out right! (They taste even better the next day!)

These are really pretty and simple cookies!

H is for Hot Lava Cakes!!!

This is my post for Alphabe-Thursday and Foodie Friday! This is a favorite of mine, they are fun to make and amazingly good and chocolatey all the way from the crumbly outside to molten gooey lava on the inside! This recipe is from my Aunt Jackie's amazing cook book!

Ingredients:

1 cup milk or semi-sweet chocolate chips

10 tablespoons butter

3 large eggs

3 egg yolks

1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

1/2 cup flour

Melt your chocolate chips with butter in the microwave. Stir after 1 minute.  Be careful as chocolate burns easily.  In another bowl, mix 3 eggs, and 3 egg yolks. Add to chocolate. Mix in powdered sugar, and flour.

Butter 6 (6 ounce) custard cups. Fill each with about 1/2 cup batter. Put on cookie sheet. Bake at 450 for about 12 1/2 minutes.(Or until the outside is crumbly, and the inside is gooey, you can use a tooth pick to see what the middle looks like.)  You have to experiment with this as ovens vary. 

You can either invert it onto a plate, or leave it in the ramekin. To invert, run a knife around the edges, turn it upside down on a plate. Makes about 6 cakes.

Raspberry Sauce:

Put about 1 cup raspberry jam into a bowl. Add as much powdered sugar and water that you would like, depending on how thick or runny you want it. Microwave the mixture and stir well. Serve it on top of lava cakes.  We use jam because it is easy and it is good; you could also make a raspberry sauce.

Super cute St. Patricks day gift!

I love these. I have done them before, except it was for Valentine's Day! If you want to see my Valentines ones, it should be labeled in my blog archive, or under holidays!

All you will need is a candle holder, a cupcake liner, ribbon, and any kind of treat you would like to put inside.( I used the Lindor Balls!)

Here is the end result!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!!!!

Pink Saturday--PINK Lotion!!!!!!!!!

I absolutely love lotion and perfume! This lotion is from Victoria's Secret, but you can also get it at Bath and Body Works. (That's where I got mine!) I thought it would be perfect for Pink Saturday because it is called PINK!!!

I Love PINK!!!!

G is for Guacamole!

For Alphabe-Thursday, I made some amazingly good and easy Guacamole!

Ingredients:

2 Avacados

2 Garlic Cloves

1 Tomato

A splash of lime juice

A sprinkle of salt and pepper

Cut the skin off of your avacados. Cut up your tomato and garlic. Put them all together in the blender. Add a splash of lime juice, and a sprinkle of salt and pepper. Blend it up to a smooth paste. Add any more salt and pepper you feel is needed. You can also add more lime juice.

You can find other "G" entries at Jenny Matlock's Alphabe-Thursday at this link:

http://jennymatlock.blogspot.com/2010/03/alphabe-thursday-g.html.

Pizza Tablescape

Friday nights at my house are pizza nights.  So here is my pizza tablescape!  I put together a more casual pizza night tablescape; my mother put together a more formal pizza night tablescape.  We shared some dishware.  You can link to her tablescape here:

http://redcouchrecipes.blogspot.com/2010/03/formal-and-thrifty-pizza-night.html.

I am linking up with Tablescape Thursday at the following link:http://betweennapsontheporch.blogspot.com/2010/03/welcome-to-80th-tablescape-thursday.html.  You can see wonderful tablescapes there. 

Pizza plates---local grocery store

Red plates---Wal-Mart

Square plates---Tai Pan Trading

Ice tea glasses---Wal-Mart

Napkins---Fabric from Wal-Mart

Silverware---Wal-Mart

Place mats---Big Lots

Small ruffeled plate---Pier 1

Red bowl---Mervyn's

Red covered bowls---Wal-Mart