Biscuit Tortoni

When I was little, my Dad would take me and my brother out for the afternoon on a Saturday to give mom a break. We'd do errands, whatever mom needed. When we came home we'd pick mom up for dinner and go to our favorite local place, a family style Italian restaurant. I always finished with a Tortoni. Biscuit Tortoni in a paper cup topped with a maraschino cherry. And my Dad always had a taste. I smile just thinking about it. I had my first date with my husband at that place, but was so nervous I never had the Tortoni :) Now it's gone but definitely not forgotten. So I made Tortoni. It reminded my husband of his favorite ice cream,  Good Humor Toasted Almond Ice Cream Bars! And my kids, they loved it. And they smiled when they thought of their Grandpa, who also took them to that restaurant and everywhere else when they were little! Just to give me a little break   :)

I did a google search for Tortoni a while back, a few years ago, and found such a great recipe on Sticky, Gooey, Creamy, Chewy and she gives a little history about the Tortoni. Just like I remembered. It was so good the when I made it that first time, but I never did get to it again. Not sure why, her recipe is so easy, it took no time at all. So I remembered and looked in my bookmarks and had to have it again. And it was so good, they want another batch. I need to buy more cookies and ice cream. Fast. Why did I wait so long?

and so once again I didn't follow directions completely and used a pint instead of a quart. And one 7 oz bag of Lazzaroni Amaretti Cookies.


Tortoni
Original source: Sticky Gooey Creamy Chewy
adapted by There's Always Thyme to Cook
Printable Recipe

1/2 cup blanched and sliced, slivered or chopped almonds
2 1/2 cups amaretti cookies (I used a 7 oz. bag of Lazzaroni Amaretti Snaps Cookies)
2 tablespoons amaretto liqueur (more or less to taste)
1 cup heavy cream, chilled
2 teaspoons almond extract
1 quart homemade or premium quality vanilla ice cream, softened (I used a pint)
Maraschino cherries, drained and halved for garnish

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Place chopped almonds on small baking sheet and toast in the oven until lightly golden. Set aside to cool. Or you can toast them in a nonstick skillet (no oil, dry) on the stove over medium heat. Be careful to watch them so they don't burn.

Put the cookies in a Ziploc plastic bag and crush the cookies into small pieces with a rolling pin, a meat pounder or your hands.  Be careful not to turn them into tiny crumbs. Place crumbled cookies in a medium bowl and toss with the almonds. Set aside.

In a large bowl, beat cream with an electric mixer until thickened. Pour in the amaretto and whip until medium peaks form. Spoon the cookie mixture into the whipped cream, reserving 3/4 cup or so for topping.

Add the almond extract to the softened ice cream and stir until blended and very smooth. Fold the cookie/whipped cream mixture into ice cream.

Spoon into little pastry cups or ramekins. Sprinkle each cup with some of the reserved cookie mixture and top with a cherry. Freeze until firm.

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Joining Beth at Beth Fish Reads for her fun Weekend Cooking Party. Every weekend. It's open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share! Go on over and see some fun posts.

Sweet Tooth Friday hosted by Alli n Son!

 Sweet as Sugar Cookies for Sweets for a Saturday!

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Savory Sunday @ The Sweet Details

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Coffee Cake!

Best coffee cake ever! I've made this one again and again and it's always a big hit. I got it from a teacher aide at my kids elementary school. The big kid is now graduating college soon, so that's how long I've had this recipe. The teacher aide brought it in to a class function and everyone begged for the recipe. I've been making it ever since. You won't even notice the coconut. But it adds to the moistness of the cake. My addition was the pecans. The original recipe didn't have them because there's no nuts allowed at school, except for the occasional parent. Myself included :)

Coffee Cake
Source: Mrs. Watson
Printable Recipe

TOPPING:
1 cup sugar
5 tablespoons chopped walnuts
2 tablespoons cinnamon
2 tablespoons sweetened shredded coconut

CAKE:
3 cups flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup butter (unsalted)
2 cups sugar
4 eggs, room temperature
2 cups sour cream
2 teaspoons vanilla

FOR TOPPING: Combine all ingredients and set aside.

FOR CAKE: Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter 9 X 13" pan. Sift flour, baking soda and salt into medium bowl. Cream butter with sugar in large bowl until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs one at a time. Beat in sour cream and vanilla. Mix in dry ingredients until just blended. Spoon into prepared pan. Sprinkle with topping. Swirl knife through topping and batter. Bake until tester comes out clean, 45-50
minutes.

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Joining the fun at

Suzy's Kitchen Bouquet for Flashback Fridays

and Sweet Tooth Friday hosted by Alli n Son!

And more fun and recipes at Sweet as Sugar Cookies for Sweets for a Saturday!

Joining Beth at Beth Fish Reads for her fun Weekend Cooking Party. Every weekend. It's open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share! Go on over and see some fun posts.

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Madeleines

Ha! I can bake sometimes without burning the potholders OR the cookies. This proves it. And I have made these Madeleine's many times. And they really are fool-proof.  I thought I had posted about them before but I couldn't find them here. They still qualify as a flashback because I have made them before. If you want an impressive little treat, try them, they are very easy, like little sponge cakes. They're very good dipped in chocolate or with a glaze. But they are out of this world good just plain, enjoyed with a nice cup of tea. If you like tea.  I'd rather have coffee but that's another story.

Madeleines
Source: Bon Appetit, January 2000
Adapted by There's Always Thyme to Cook
Printable Recipe

2 large eggs
2/3 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon grated lemon peel
pinch salt
1 cup all-purpose flour
10 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks) unsalted butter, melted, cooled slightly
powdered sugar, for dusting

Preheat oven to 375°F. Generously butter and flour pan for large madeleines. Using an electric mixer, beat eggs and sugar in large bowl just to blend. Beat in vanilla, lemon peel and salt. Add flour; beat just until blended. Gradually add cooled melted butter in steady stream, beating just until blended. Do not overbeat.

Spoon 1 tablespoon of batter into each indentation in pan. Bake until puffed and brown, about 15 minutes. Cool 5 minutes. Gently remove from pan. Repeat process, buttering and flouring pan before each batch.

Dust cookies with powdered sugar or you can dip them in melted chocolate or drizzle lemon glaze on top.

For Lemon Glaze: mix enough powdered sugar with 2 tablespoons of fresh lemon juice to get the consistency you like

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Joining Beth at Beth Fish Reads for her fun Weekend Cooking Party. Every weekend. It's open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share! Go on over and see some fun posts.

and joining the fun at Suzy's Kitchen Bouquet for Flashback Fridays

And more fun and recipes at Sweet as Sugar Cookies for Sweets for a Saturday!

and joining Sweet Tooth Friday hosted by Alli n Son!

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Sweets for a Saturday: Lemon Brownies

If you like lemon, you'll like these. They are nice and dense. Glaze them or or not. If you want the glaze to soak in, then glaze them while they're warm. You can dust with powdered sugar instead but I guarantee if you like lemony cakes and cookies, you'll love these lemony brownies. I got the original recipe a while back from Marilyn on a cooking forum, she got it from a Paula Deen recipe and adapted it to lemons, and that was that. Paula Deen made Orange Brownies. No orange for me. Lemon all the way! A really tasty non-chocolate brownie! But I could be persuaded into making chocolate brownies, too!

Lemon Brownies
Source: Marilyn (DanaIN, Cooking Forum)
Printable Recipe

1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cup sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks) butter; room temperature
4 eggs
Juice from 1/2 lemon
Zest from 1 lemon
1 cup powdered sugar
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
Additional lemon zest for garnish

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Line the bottom only of a 9X13X2-inch baking dish with Parchment paper and spray with Pam. In a mixing bowl, stir together flour, sugar and salt; add butter. Stir together eggs, juice from 1/2 lemon and zest from 1 lemon; stir into batter and pour into prepared pan. Bake for 30 minutes or until set, use a toothpick to check. Remove from oven and cool on a rack. When brownies are cool prepare glaze by stirring together powdered sugar and 2 tablespoon lemon juice; drizzle over brownies and sprinkle with additional lemon zest.

Joining in on the fun at Sweet as Sugar Cookies for Sweets for a Saturday!

and joining Sweet Tooth Friday hosted by Alli n Son!

and a Themed Bakers Sunday at Cupcake Apothecary. The theme this week is lemons!

 Food on Friday at Carole's Chatter 

 

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April Fool's Flashback!

Joining Suzy from Kitchen Bouquet for another Flashback Friday!  

This time for April Fool's Day, I'm flashing back to Fushi! 

FAKE + SUSHI = FUSHI!

My original post is here.

I must have made thousands of those treats over the years because for a long time I was a baking counselor in a day camp! So one year we decided to change it up a bit and make Fake Sushi, we called it Fushi. It's fun to make, fun to eat and it's really easy. Not to mention sticky. All you need is marshmallows, butter, Rice Krispies cereal, green fruit rollups or any color really, and some Twizzlers pull-n-peel candy, gummy worms, you can get as creative as you like. It's a fun, gooey mess, but the kids love it! And so did one or two adults :)

Fushi
Source:  FamilyFun Magazine
adapted by There's Always Thyme to Cook

Printable Recipe

Makes 4 to 5 dozen

1/4 cup butter
4 cups mini marshmallows
6 cups crisped rice cereal
20 to 25 gummy worms (or Twizzler's Pull-n-Peel)
1 to 2 boxes fruit leather

Grease a 12- by 17-inch baking sheet. Melt butter in a 2-quart saucepan over medium heat. Add the marshmallows and stir until smooth.

Remove the mixture from the heat and stir in the rice cereal until it's evenly coated. Turn the baking sheet so that the shorter ends are at the top and bottom. Then press the marshmallow mixture onto the sheet, distributing it evenly.

Starting at one side an inch up from the lower edge, place gummy worms atop the mixture end to end in a horizontal line. Gently roll the lower edge of the marshmallow mixture over the gummy worms.

Then stop and cut the log away from the rest of the mixture. Use the same method to form 4 more logs. Slice each log into 1-inch-thick "sushi" rolls and wrap them individually with a strip of fruit leather. Garnish with julienne slices of dried apricots!

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Stuffed French Toast!

As if lemon curd wasn't good enough on it's own, try stuffing it inside two pieces of French toast and then topping it with blueberry sauce!  And just to try something different, put it in the panini maker.

 On the first try, I had to learn, DO NOT PRESS DOWN! That was some mess. It still tasted great!

 Got the hang of it on the second try, they were really good. Even squished. Loved the French Toast panini, will definitely use the panini maker, even for plain French Toast! Just cut the bread slices thick, and don't press down too hard.

French Toast Stuffed with Lemon Cream

Source: Bed and Breakfast Foodie Blog, original recipe from The White Oak Inn
adapted by There's Always Thyme to Cook
Printable Recipe

1 loaf of Brioche or Challah Bread, cut into 1/2-inch slices
1 8-ounce package cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup of lemon curd (click here for an easy recipe)
2 tablespoons powdered sugar
8 eggs
1 can evaporated milk
2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon almond extract
1 cup of frozen blueberries
1/4 cup sugar or less if you like
1/2 cup water
small squeeze of fresh lemon
1 tablespoon butter for pan, more or less

Preheat oven to 200 degrees. Place a baking sheet in oven.

Mix together the cream cheese, lemon curd and powdered sugar. Divide this between half of the slices of bread and spread to almost the edge of the bread, leaving about 1/4-inch. Top with the remaining slices of bread. Beat the eggs with evaporated milk, sugar and almond extract. Dip each sandwich in the egg mixture to coat both sides.

Working in batches, coat the bottom of a skillet or griddle with some butter and heat over medium-high heat. Cook until golden brown. Then turn the French toast over and cook until golden brown on that side. Add butter as necessary to the griddle. You can also use a panini maker, but don't press down hard or the lemon cream will squish out, just close the top enough so both sides cook! Transfer French toast to baking sheet in a low oven to keep warm. Serve with warm blueberry sauce.

To make the sauce, combine berries, lemon, sugar and water in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil, then lower heat to simmer and cook over low heat for about ten minutes or more to thicken. To get the sauce a little thicker, you can add a little cornstarch dissolved with water, and mixed into the sauce, bring back to the boil. Serve over French Toast.

Joining Sweet as Sugar Cookies for Sweets for a Saturday!

and joining Sweet Tooth Friday hosted by Alli n Son!

 and

 Food on Friday at Carole's Chatter 

 

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