Today was a country cooking day!

One of the biggest things that I miss from living in England is the open air markets or farmers markets that they had on a almost daily basis. England was great at supporting the local farmers in that every good sized town had a market or farm stand or the lady with a table sitting outside her house with homemade preserves and a small basket when people put in the money for goods purchased. Yes they still relied on the honor system there. And from the looks of repeat farm stands people were honorable!


Today my friend Em asked me to go with her to the Abilene Farmers Market. OF COURSE! It was my first market in over 6 months. I was super excited. It was the size of a small town weekday market in England but OH THE FUN of being able to support local farmers and families. 


Later I will post what I made with my market finds, peaches is the only clue you get!

One of my favorite blogs is The Country Cook 
Today without thinking about it I was fiddling in the kitchen. First I made watermelon jelly, and if that sets the way it is supposed to I will post that up. After that was canned and cooling I thought 'well lets just keep this going.' So on to 7-UP cake. 

Now I LOVE 7-UP cake and have always gotten it from the Commissary or bakery, I have never tried to make it myself. BUT Brandie has ALWAYS given me such fabulous recipes that I just had to try hers.

It looks phenomenal doesnt it? Well since I can tell you it tastes BETTER than it looks! 

It is a super easy cake that you will be able to make over and over again. 

Ingredients:

1 box, Yellow cake mix

1 box, 3.4 oz instant lemon pudding

1 1/2 cups 7-up

4 eggs

3/4 cup Canola oil

Icing:

2 cups Confectioners sugar

 1 TBSP Lemon Juice (bottled works just as well as fresh)

1-2 TBSP Milk


Pre-heat oven to 325°F.
Spray a 10-inch bundt cake pan with baking spray. (The one with flour in it)
In a medium bowl combine all cake ingriedients and mix thoroughly.
Pour batter into prepared bundt pan.
Bake for 45-55 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.
Allow to cool completely in the pan. 
Remove onto serving dish.
PREPARE ICING:
In a small bowl combine the powdered sugar and lemon juice. Add milk slowly while mixing to desired consistency. 
Pour icing over cake and serve!

YUMMY!

And how was this a country cooking kind of day? Well I made Spasagna for dinner. I am telling you Ms. Brandie is AWESOME! 
 

No more MONKEYS jumping on the bed....

Monkey bread. 

The first time I heard of this concoction I was beside myself. HOW can something named after a hairy beast that likes to poop on its hand and fling it at passerby be any good? And why on earth would you promote such a thing?

Then I tasted the bubbled up cinnamony tastiness.

OMG! OMG!

That was about all I could come up with.

I learned VERY quickly that I could only take 2 MAYBE 3 pieces of it and then STOP completely because otherwise I would need the entire vial of insulin to counter act the sugar that this bread has. You see, I am Diabetic and most of everything I bake I dont eat. I send to work with my husband and he gives it to his little worker bees. I have been Diabetic for such a long time that in all reality most times I dont miss the sweets.

Tell me I can no longer bake and I might have to rip your head off. :)

My monkey bread I hear is the "nectar of the gods". It has been requested SO many times from the little worker bees that I have gotten sick of making it. My husband loves it and today being our 9th wedding anniversary, ROUND OF APPLAUSE, I feel I have to make it for him. And because its SUPER easy and SUPER delicious I had to share the recipe!

Ingredients
3 (12-ounce) cans refrigerated biscuits
1 cup sugar
2 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons cinnamon, divided
1 teaspoon nutmeg
3/4 cup butter
3/4 cup packed brown sugar

Method

1. 1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2. Cut biscuits into quarters. In a bag, combine sugar. 2 teaspoons cinnamon, and nutmeg. Drop biscuits into bag; shake until coated. 
3. Stack the biscuits in a greased tube or bundt pan.
4. In a sauce pan combine remaining 3 ingredients. Heat until brown sugar dissolves, but do not boil. Pour hot syrup over biscuits.
5. Bake for 30 minutes or until rolls test done. 
6. Wait 5 minutes before turning out onto serving plate.

Flan

MMMMMMM. FLAN.

That mysterious not quite jello not quite custard Mexican concoction that you either love or hate. Many feel that the consistency with its not quite jello not quite custard feel is what turns them off. Others find that the vanilla sweetness is just DIVINE! I am one of the DIVINE people. I grew up with the crazy jello-custard so is sort of like a comfort food for me. I love the smell and the memories it brings me when I make it.

Did you know that flan dates back to Roman times? The Romans were some of the first to keep domesticated chickens for laying eggs. The Romans, referring to the Greeks knowledge in cooking came up with this custardly concoction we now know as flan. I think it would surprise you at some of the flans they came up with though, for example, eel flan was a popular treat. They also had a sweet flan that was sweetened with honey.

Though the Roman empire fell onto itself, flan survived all Barbarian invasions. When it resurfaced, it was generally a sweet dish. But still the same recipe of mixing cream and eggs was there. The word flan is actually derived from the Latin "flado" meaning flat cake. 

After the fall of Rome, flan resurfaced in Spain as generally a sweet dish. When Christopher Columbus 'concurred' the Americas, he brought a lot of his country of origins recipes and traditions with him. Flan being one of them. Nearly all of Central and South America loves flan in all its forms. It is now most widely associated with Mexico where flan is prepared in all its excellent forms in both rich and poor kitchens!

England went its own way with flan. The English LOVE their pastry, so they developed a type of flan with a pastry bottom. The pastry shell is filled with the custard and often it is mixed with fruits and nuts.

Now, there is some dispute as to how the word FLAN is pronounced. Many rhyme it with 'plan' but if you are going to pronounce it in the correct Spanish it rhymes more with 'faun'.

In my family the recipe for flan is quite simple in ingredients. It uses sweetened condensed milk to sweeten the custard while still sticking to the basics of cream and eggs. My Mexican version is the sweet kind, flavored with vanilla and baked in ramekins in a bain marie. Though flans are not so easy to make they are WELL worth the effort.

Delgado Family Flan

1 cup sugar

6 eggs

1 can sweetened condensed milk
1 can of whole milk, refilled from the can of sweetened condensed milk

1 Tbs Vanilla

1. Melt sugar in a sauce pan until caramelized. Pour into 6 ramekins. The sugar will solidify and turn completely hard, but don't worry, it will liquefy again after baking and remain that way.
2. In a blender, place eggs, both milks and vanilla. Blend very well. This method is much easier and faster than hand mixing. I have also used a food processor. 
3. Pour egg mixture over the caramelized sugar in the ramekins evenly. 
4. Place a large casserole dish on the oven rack in the oven and fill with about an inch of water. Place ramekins into the dish and gently slide into the oven.
5. Bake at 350°F for one hour, or until center is almost set.

You can decorate it with mint leaves, whipped cream, strawberries, cherries, etc. depending on your taste.