11 Jul 2016

Strawberries and Cream Biscuits

by | posted in: food, The Charming South Kitchen | 0

Strawberries and Cream Biscuits

I grew up in the South.  Some folks don’t consider Florida to be the South, but when you live in the middle of the state all your life surrounded by orange groves and muscadine vines, take vacations to state parks and the Suwanee River, and live on Publix fried chicken and church potlucks, you are definitely from the South.

For me, summer in the south meant swimming in our pool (my Mom opened the pool season April 1), playing baseball in our yard with my cousins, listening for our “school bell” to ring to tell us it was time to come home, and heading to the Circle K for ice cream (31 flavors never got old) and watching Mets baseball via WWOR.

For me now, summer is summer.  Its hotter. And I love to pick fruit.  Strawberries, blueberries, peaches, you name it.  If it is available to me, I want to pick it.  And I love to bake with it.  From peach cobblers to strawberry pizza, and these strawberries and cream biscuits.

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Strawberries and Cream Biscuits
Author: 
Recipe type: bread
Cuisine: southern
Prep time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 
Serves: 6-8
 
A mildly sweet strawberry biscuit waiting for some honey and peanut butter.
Ingredients
  • 1¾ - 2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 4 tsp baking powder
  • ¼ tsp baking soda
  • ⅕ tsp kosher salt
  • 6 T cold, unsalted butter
  • 6-7 strawberries (tops removed), mashed
  • 2 T turbinado sugar
  • ¾ cup full fat buttermilk
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 400. A cast iron pan grill pan will be a great cooking sheet!
  2. Mix dry ingredients in a food processor.
  3. Slice butter and put in food processor.
  4. Pulse until small pebbles form in dry ingredients.
  5. Mash strawberries and pour in the sugar. Let sit for 5-10 minutes.
  6. Add in buttermilk.
  7. Pour slowly into the food processor and let it mix well with the dry ingredients.
  8. Turn out onto a floured cutting board and kneed for 1-2 minutes, adding flour if necessary.
  9. Form into a ¾ inch high circle and cut into biscuits.
  10. Put in cast iron pan and bake for about 20 minutes.
  11. Take out and let cool on cooling rack.
  12. Serve with butter, honey, strawberry jam, or peanut butter - or some of all.
 

28 Aug 2014

Vanilla Lime Watermelon Salad

by | posted in: food, The Charming South Kitchen, vegan, vegetarian | 0

Vanilla Lime Watermelon Salad

And summer is slowly coming to an end.  Zoo Atlanta is less crowded during the day.  More school buses are always on the streets around town.  Malls are less jam packed with kids.

School may have started, but summer fruits are still thriving.  This past weekend I went over to Alabama to visit with some family and I got treated to two farm-grown watermelons.  One had yellow flesh and one had the typical red flesh.  Both were beautiful and sweet.

So, I paired them both with some balsamic and olive oil!  What?  That doesn’t go with watermelon.  It does if you have some specialty balsamic and olive oil from Oli & Ve in Roswell.  I paired this for a tasting there and knew that I would be purchasing both.  That tasted amazing together.

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Vanilla Lime Watermelon Salad
Author: 
Recipe type: Salad
Cuisine: Fruit Salad
Prep time: 
Total time: 
Serves: 2
 
Fresh summer fruit that is simply dressed - perfect.
Ingredients
  • 1 cup yellow flesh watermelon, cubed and seeded
  • 1 cup red flesh watermelon, cubed and seeded
  • 2 tsp vanilla balsamic vinegar
  • 2 tsp persian lime olive oil
  • salt and fresh cracked pepper to taste
Instructions
  1. Put watermelon in a bowl. Combine the oil and vinegar together. Drizzle over top of the fruit. Season with salt and pepper. Eat!
  2. I like this served room temperature. Would be a great side dish to a pork or tacos or fish
 

8 Dec 2011

Fruit and Bran make a wonderful muffin

by | posted in: food | 0

Moist, healthy, filling, fruit: what more could you want in a morning muffin?

I have tons of recipes that I’ve torn out of magazines over the years and I’m trying to actually cook through them.  Now that I have someone to cook for it makes it a little easier (and I always need ideas)!

These were very moist and have plenty of fruit and fiber in them.  And they are under 200 calories. 

1 1/2 cup all bran (the cereal)

3/4 cup whole wheat flour

3 T sugar

1/2 tsp baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon

1 egg

3/4 cup buttermilk

1/2 ripe banana, mashed

1/4 cup molasses

2 T oil

1 apple, tart, chopped

1/2 cup frozen blueberries (don’t thaw) – use you can use fresh

Combine first ingredients (through the cinnamon).  Mix the wet ingredients.  Mix together with dry.  Fold in apple and blueberries.  Bake in greased muffin tins, fill 3/4 of the way, bake at 350 for about 23 minutes, give or take.  Cook for 5 minutes, then cool on rack.  Serve warm.

15 Apr 2010

California Waldorf Salad: from Moosewood

by | posted in: Uncategorized | 0

Well, here was my first recipe from the 100$ for 1.50 cookbook. I like it ok- just wouldn’t serve it for dinner (which is what I’m doing).

3 large apples, chopped (I used 1 large golden delicious and 2 medium pink ladies, skin on)
juice of 2 lemons, divided
2 tangerines (I would use mandarin oranges next time – no seeding)
2 stalks celery (I used 2 instead of 1)
1/4 cup dried currants
1/2 cup cashews (I didn’t toast them)

Dressing: (sweeter than I thought, would use less honey next time)
1 cup plain ff yogurt
1 small avocado (maybe the world’s perfect food)
zest of half lemon
3 T honey (I used orange blossom)

Toss apple mixture with juice of one of the lemons.
Mix dressing and other lemon juice in a blender till smooth.
Mix together gently.
Serve over mixed greens.

I would serve this for a brunch in the summer. Pretty and light and sweet. Would be good paired with muffins.
23 Mar 2010

Lemon Bars (Gluten and Dairy Free) – SO YUMMY!

by | posted in: Uncategorized | 1

I love hanging out with other healthy foodies. I learn so much. My friends Jenny and Michelle and I hung out for lunch today. Michelle has a hard time with her diet – trying to figure out what her body will and won’t “accept”. She made these amazing bars! I loved how full of protein they were and how amazingly delicious they were, also.
My Papa would love them – never knowing they were healthy for him.
I will definitely be making these – so incredibly good to take on a picnic or somewhere during the summer because they are tangy and summer-y!

14 Jan 2010

Blueberry Orange Scones (2010.2)

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My friend Sarah and I went to a bummer of a cooking show last year. Neither one of us were impressed. The two best parts of the evening were the free magazine subscription and eating out at Old Spaghetti Factory that night in dtown Ville.

One of the recipes I got from Healthy Cooking over the summer was this one. Here are my thoughts: healthier than most scones, easy, doesn’t look at all like the picture, not too muc orange flavor, love the picture that I took. Pretty with blueberry layers! I overcooked them a bit, but SBTS PhD students didn’t seem to mind and they are all gone.
2 cups flour
3 T sugar
2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp grated orange peel
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp soda
1/4 tsp cloves
1/2 stick cold unsalted butter, chopped up
1/2 cup skim milk (I didn’t feel like making buttermilk, so this worked fine)
1/4 cup fresh squeezed naval orange juice
1/2 cup frozen blueberries (I picked these this summer)
Mix all dry. Cut in butter. Combine juice and milk. Fold in berries. Knead a little. Cut into 8 triangles and cook on greased cookie sheet for 12 minutes at 425. Take out and enjoy warm.
200 c, 6 fat, 1 fiber (use whole wheat flour if you want more).

14 Jan 2010

Day 3 of Green (Blue) Smoothies

by | posted in: Vegetables | 0

This morning my smoothie ended up being blue – blueberries are potent! Mine was thick and sweet. The blender seemed extra loud to me this morning, so I didn’t mix it as much. Still so good – and I cranked it all into a calculator – 145c, .5 f, 6 fiber! I also had a pb thin which was good and so I’ll be full for a good bit!

1/4 red delicious apple
1/2 banana
1/2 naval orange (I used the juice of it last night for some scones, recipe coming later)
1/4 cup frozen blueberries
1 1/2 cup spinach
2 small stalks kale
1 1/4 cup water

Mix all. Enjoy.

Since I forgot the ground flax seed – I sprinkled some on my pb thin this morning – added a little texture!
Happy Breakfasting no matter what color your smoothies!

13 Jan 2010

Day 2 of Green Smoothies

by | posted in: Vegetables | 0

I am trying Green smoothies for 5 days in a row this week. So far, yesterday, I was fuller all day (which basically means I needed less to fill me up once I got hungry again – if that makes any sense at all).
Here was my smoothie this morning
1/4 red delicious apple
1 cup frozen strawberries
1/2 small banana
2 small branches kale
1 1/2 cups spinach
2 tsp ground flax
1 1/2 cups water

Not as sweet as yesterdays, but good – and healthy for me.

10 Jan 2010

Apple Barley Breakfast Cereal (2010.1)

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2010 has arrived in full fashion. This year is the year of using all those recipes that I clip out of magazines – I have a TON! So, this week was something for breakfast (or I made it for breakfast).

1/2 cup barley – quick cooking
1 cup water (just follow directions on box)
1 apple (I used braeburn)
1 tsp unsalted butter
sprinkle of cinnamon
1 T lemon juice
1/8 tsp sugar

Cook barley. Saute apple in butter (chopped, I left peel on), sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar and stir in lemon juice. Mix all together.
I eat mine cold with 1/2 cup vanilla yogurt on top and some cool whip. Good.
Unfortunately, not very filling which I’m surprised. But, good none the less and relatively healthy.
This recipe came from Cuisine At Home magazine. This definitely wasn’t a keeper – but one to try nonetheless. And gets me trying new grains. And I had everything on hand as well.