At Home My Way

 Recipe at the top, chit-chat at the bottom! Razzleberry Pie   2 pie crusts (homemade or roll & bake; I used a generic store brand) 4 cups of frozen mixed berries, THAWED (I used two 16 oz packages Great Value Berry Medley from Walmart) 3/4  cup sugar (white/granulated) 1/4 cup cornstarch (flour would work also) 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1 Tablespoon lemon juice 1 egg (for brushing the pie before baking) Sprinkling sugar Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Place bottom crust (unbaked) in pie pan. (If using a rolled unbaked crust, I first roll on a floured surface so is a little bigger than my pie pan and drapes over the edges.) In mixing bowl, combine berries (thawed but cool, including juice), sugar, cornstarch, cinnamon, and lemon juice.  Gently stir until combined. Gently pour berry mixture into unbaked crust. For lattice crust: Roll the unbaked crust on floured surface. Cut into wide strips, app. 1 inch wide.  (I used a pizza cutter for this.) Place horizont...

Cherry Cola Jello Salad I made this bright and refreshing Cherry Cola Jello Salad  to go with our super bowl menu.   I had made it a very long time ago and this weekend was looking for something refreshing and not as heavy as my usual chocolate cake dessert.   My daughter and her boyfriend were in from KC and they just loved it!   I was concerned at first that the addition of cherry pie filling would make this dessert overly sweet (because I couldn't really remember much about the last time I made it other than we loved it).  Rest assured, it does not taste overly sweet.  The crushed pineapple combined with the cherry pie filling and jello gives this dessert the perfect combination of sweet and tart.  It is easy to put together and I made it the morning of our super bowl meal. I also made Homemade Whipped Cream to serve with our  Cherry Cola Jello Salad but it really isn't necessary. This dessert easily stands alone! Take it...

It's that time of year again!  'Tis the season for treat days, goody days, parties, carry-ins and guests in general.  Sometimes I have lots of time to prepare snacks and treats but there are other times, that I don't have much time at all.   It's nice this time of year to reassess the things you might make that are inexpensive, if you don't have a lot of money to spare, and a few things that are super quick, if you don't have much time.  Yesterday, my daughter, Rebecca texted me and asked what she could make for her office carry-in meal the next day.  Her department had been assigned desserts.  I suggested a few things like Pumpkin Crunch Dessert, Sugar Cookie Bars   (because they are delicious but cheap to make - and most generally you have everything on hand): I also suggested making brownies, Chocolate Mayonnaise Cake with Easy Chocolate Frosting (again, a very frugal, pantry ingredient, dessert) (someone was already making brownies):...

We have a great little cookie bakery in the town where I work called "Hot Box Cookies".  The cookies are heavy, moist, and fantastic!  We only get Hot Box Cookies on super special occasions and one of the guys at work had a birthday complete with some Hot Box Cookies not too long ago.  One of my favorites is the Red Velvet White Chocolate Chip cookies that they have so I set out recently to come up with a recipe that I could make at home. Wouldn't you know it, I had everything I needed except butter.  Typical in my kitchen!  I did have some coconut oil which I sometimes use as a replacement for the fat in my recipes and/or in my soap making.  I decided to just use coconut oil instead of butter in my cookie recipe.  It was amazing!  I liked them so much that I decided to only make this recipe with coconut oil.  The cookies turned out nice and fat, crisp on the outside and chewy on the inside.  So good!  I am definitely going to...

Seems like these days (in my area anyway), some of the greatest treats at showers and weddings are being forgotten.  What happened to the MINTS AND NUTS? I would say 100% of the recent weddings and showers I've been to lately don't serve mints, nuts, OR punch?  What's up with that?  I get the peanut allergies are causing a problem for mixed nuts, but what about the MINTS?  And bring back the PUNCH! When I got married (I know... way back in the dark ages), we didn't serve everyone a full meal.  We got married and at the reception, everyone enjoyed and looked forward to lusciously huge slices of delicious, beautifully decorated wedding cake as well as pastel butter mints, and frothy punch.  These days, these simple pleasures seem to be amiss at weddings and showers. So being the complete traditionalist that I am, when I hosted the baby shower for my niece last week I knew for sure that I was serving mints and punch.  My neph...

I like to post Quick on the Table recipes during the week, but sometimes on the weekends you have time to make something wonderful, something delicious, an extra special treat. Maybe you have overnight guests coming or want to make a super fancy pastry for your family this weekend.  This will be the recipe to try first!  The dough is easy, mixed in a bowl, and no kneading.  It does need to rest in the fridge overnight (or at least eight hours), but time intensive, it is not!  Give it a try and let me know how you like it!  I made this special pastry for Christmas morning at my house.  It was divine!  It wasn't hard, it wasn't really time consuming, but it WAS YUMMY!  I think its right up there with one of those beautiful shiny pastries you see under glass in boutique-type bakeries.  If I was ever to own a bakery, I would serve this and I bet I would have people lined up out the door! The recipe makes t...