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Granola Goodness | Recipe

February 1, 2012 By Laura Leave a Comment

We love granola around here! It’s such a good and wholesome snack, handful after handful, with CrUnCh! (Oh, how I love crunch.) It’s really a great way to start your day off right too, in the morning! Throw some in a bowl with a few splashes of cold milk, or load it on top of a serving of yogurt!

Unfortunately, it’s next to impossible to find ‘peanut-safe’ granola at the markets. Added to the allergies now, is cashews and pistachios. Even small amounts of granola are kind of pricey to buy, ready-made, anyway. So, if we want granola (and we do!), it’s up to us to make it homemade. But we don’t mind, because it’s easy and fun to make, and we can make BIG batches.

granola-recipe We have posted another granola recipe here on the blog before, and that one can be found here. There is so many ways to make granola! Experimenting with different ingredients, is half the fun and surprise! Here is the granola recipe we’ve been crunching on this week!

Granola Goodness

(Note: All C.(cup) measurements are heaping – not level.)

4C rolled oats
1 1/2 C shredded unsweetened coconut
1 C wheat germ
1/2 C natural bran (We used Fiber One cereal.)
2 C raisins
1/2 C cooking oil
1/2 C honey
1/2 tsp. vanilla

(*Chopped nuts optional. We have a kiddo allergic.)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine dry ingredients in a large bowl. In a small saucepan, combine oil and honey. Stir over low heat until the honey is melted and it’s warm and blended with the oil enough. (About 5 minutes.) Stir in vanilla. Pour oil mixture over dry ingredients, little by little, mixing to blend well. Spread mixture on two cookie sheets, and bake for for 15-20 minutes until lightly browned, stirring and flipping mixture over about half way through time. Let cool completely. Store in an airtight container. Makes about 12+ cups!

Granola Goodness

Prep time

15 mins

Cook time

15 mins

Total time

30 mins

There is nothing like a good granola! Here we are sharing our recipe with you, in hopes you'll enjoy it as much as we do!

: House of Joyful Noise blog

: Snack

Serves: 12 Cups

Ingredients

4C rolled oats
1½ C shredded unsweetened coconut
1 C wheat germ
½ C natural bran (We used Fiber One cereal.)
2 C raisins
½ C cooking oil
½ C honey
½ tsp. vanilla
(*Chopped nuts optional. We have a kiddo allergic.)

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Combine dry ingredients in a large bowl.
In a small saucepan, combine oil and honey.
Stir over low heat until the honey is melted and it's warm and blended with the oil enough. (About 5 minutes.)
Stir in vanilla.
Pour oil mixture over dry ingredients, little by little, mixing to blend well.
Spread mixture on two cookie sheets, and bake for for 15-20 minutes until lightly browned, stirring and flipping mixture over about half way through time.
Let cool completely.
Store in an airtight container. Makes about 12+ cups!

Valentine Ladybug Mint Cookies

January 24, 2012 By Laura 4 Comments

These adorable Ladybug Cookies I came up with, come right in time for Valentine’s Day, and I promise you, they couldn’t be easier to make! (There’s not even baking involved!) I think you are going to love what they are made with, too! (You know…besides LOVE.) I’m talking ingredients. These cookies are also a sweet idea for a little girl’s birthday party, or to send in with your kids to school, to share with their class. You’ll look so clever. (You don’t have to tell a soul it was my idea. ; )

Does the word fondant scare you? Ever heard of the stuff? I know it makes more than a few nervous. But it can actually be a LOT of fun to play with! (Think Play Dough. ; ) Truth be told, in this recipe, we did make and dye our own marshmallow fondant, simply because we knew how, and we think it tastes a little better than store bought. But you don’t have to! Rolled and ready fondant is available in craft and baking supply stores, and even comes in colors! I know Wilton sells ready-made fondant, but I heard a brand called Satin Ice, tastes better. I see that the Satin Ice brand is available to order online. I’ve seen it in a container so you probably roll that out yourself. I have not tried it yet, but I will. But if you’d like to learn how to make your own marshmallow fondant like we did, we have a tutorial coming up on that. For today, we’re just going to show you how simple it is to put together these cookies, with some light pink fondant all ready to go!

Participating Ingredients:

Keebler Grasshopper Fudge Mint Cookies *(peanut safe)
Junior Mints Candy (*peanut safe)
Fondant – in light pink (rolled and ready)
Any kind of icing (for piping glue)
Sprinkles in Valentine shapes/colors (*peanut safety varies with brands)
Confectionery Sugar
(Mini marshmallows and color dye seen are for making your own fondant, if you are.)

* One of our boys has a serious peanut allergy, so we are always checking ingredients carefully, for his safety.

We rolled out our fondant on wax paper and a little dusting of confectionery sugar, making sure to roll it thin and even.

Next, we cut circles out of the fondant. These will be the wings. We started with this small cookie cutter, but it turned out to be a little bigger than we wanted the circles to be, as the cookies were smaller than this. It was the smallest actual circle cookie cutter we had, so we needed to improvise. And so the search began throughout the house, to find something that will cut the circles smaller.

Phew! Good think we have a drink now and then! ; ) This shaker/mixer top turned out to be just right!

Cut the circles in half, and the wings are done!

valentine-ladybug-cookies-5 I told you! Easy, right?

It’s mere assembly, from here on out, Friends.

Put some of that icing in a piping bag, with the smallest tip, and just put a little on each side of the cookies.

(These cookies do tend to come a little stuck together in the packaging, so we made efforts to pipe on the messy sides, leaving the smoothest and nicest part of the cookie at the bottom, where it will show between the wings.)

Put the wings on, as shown above. Like a ladybug’s wings, slightly spread.

Pipe a little dab of icing on the back/flatter side of a Junior Mint candy…..

….and stick on the head.

All that is left to do, is decorate the wings a little! We tried to arrange them, like the dots usually on the wings of a ladybug, as we recalled. You do want to be sure, that you press the decorative sprinkles down into the fondant. You may even want to add a dab of water? (Didn’t try that). If the sprinkles aren’t pressed down enough, they’ll fall off when the fondant sets up more.

THAT’S IT!! How CUTE are these? How EASY are these?

You can make a whole bunch, in no time at all. And it’s fun!

Our kids all got in on the action! They were on their own (the three younger ones are 9 years old here.). But even younger ones can put these cookies together with a little help!

We used the red cots from Confetti Sprinkles too.

If you think about it, you could use some alternative ingredients, to make these cookies similarly as well. Oreo cookies could be cute. Dark brown M&M’s can be used as heads. (They are not peanut safe, for us.) Use your imagination!

Just for fun, can you spot the ladybug, who’s wings were cut too big?

We hope you liked this cute little idea. Share it. 🙂 And thanks for stopping by the House!

Stay tuned, for more thoughts and shares on the way! Valentine’s Day related, and otherwise.

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Delightful Cranberry Muffins

January 17, 2012 By Laura 2 Comments

The rest of my family loves anything made with cranberries. But loving these muffins came as a big surprise to me, the first time my daughter made them. Reason being, I personally have never cared much for cranberry bread of any kind. I figured, it was cranberries, period, that I didn’t like. And between you and me, that felt a little wrong, and perhaps a bit of info I should keep to myself, living in an area simply surrounded by cranberry bogs, and in the town that until fairly recently) was the home of Ocean Spray Cranberry World. You’ll also never hear me say “Pass the cranberry sauce” at the Thanksgiving table, either. Although, I don’t mind a little spread on 2 slices of toasted bread with plenty of mayonnaise, when making my turkey sandwiches in the following days. I do enjoy cranberry juice now too, and with Ocean Spray still nearby in Massachusetts, there is plenty of that around. At many warm- seasoned waterfront events, representatives of Ocean Spray are often set up giving out free samples of their large variety of juices. So….they were bound to grow on me, so to speak. Cranberries are wonderful to decorate with, too! I especially love using them with my winter ice sculpture yard decor! They add such a beautiful splash of color, against winter.

In the next year or so, we plan to take a cranberry-related field trip or two, with the kids. So you’ll likely be seeing some interesting educational information and photos about cranberries and cranberry bogs around here, in the future. And perhaps more recipes as well. We hope you enjoy this one as much as we have.

. . . . . .

Delightful Cranberry Muffins

Ingredients:

1/2 cup butter, softened
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 cup sour cream
2 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup chopped frozen or fresh cranberries

TOPPING:

2 tbsp. sugar
1/8 tsp. ground cinnamon

Directions:

In a mixing bowl, cream together butter and sugar. Add eggs and vanilla; mix well. Fold in sour cream. Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt; stir into creamed mixture just until moistened. Fold in cranberries. Fill greased or paper lined muffin tins 2/3 full. Combine topping ingredients; sprinkle over muffins. Bake at 400 degrees F for 20-25 minutes, or until a toothpick, or until the muffins test done. Cool in pan 10 minutes; remove to wire rack. When completely cooled, store in a container.

Makes about 18 muffins.

These muffins freeze very well, also. We like to make a couple of batches at a time, and freeze some, to take out and pop in the microwave, on any morning we fancy. : )

cranberry-muffins-recipe Enjoy!…Warm or cold, with or without butter.

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Josh’s Double-Chocolate Biscottis Recipe

May 15, 2011 By Laura 1 Comment

A friend of ours baked our family thesedouble-chocolate biscottis, and we enjoyed them so much, we asked him for the recipe. (So we could have some more!). He very kindly sent the recipe to us, and he also suggested it as a blog post. We thought it was a great idea! It’s just not nice not to share, Italian cookies this good

bis·cot·ti

Definition of BISCOTTI : small rectangular twice-baked cookies, typically containing *nuts, made originally in Italy.

*We omitted nuts, as one in our family has a serious allergy to nuts.

Josh’s Double Chocolate Biscotti Recipe
Recipe

Participating Ingredients

1 cup of butter, softened
1 1/3 cups of sugar
½ of a cup of unsweetened cocoa powder
4 teaspoons of baking powder
4 eggs
3 ½ cups all-purpose flour
½ cup of white chocolate pieces
¼ cup milk, semisweet, or dark chocolate pieces

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Lightly grease 2 or more cookie sheets. Beat the softened butter with an electric mixer on medium/high speed for 45 seconds to a minute. Add sugar, cocoa powder, and baking powder. Beat until combined. Beat in the eggs until combined. Beat in flour, “If you can’t beat in all the flour, just stir it in.” Stir in the chocolate pieces.

Divide the dough in fourths: shape into four loaves and put them on the cookie sheets, adjusting the thickness and length of them to fit in the cookie sheet but not bake into each other.

Bake for 23 to 28 minutes or until wood toothpicks inserted near the centers comes out clean. Cool the loaves on cutting boards for 1 to 4 hours. (They slice easier if you let them cool longer and become more firm.)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Use a serrated bread knife to cut each loaf into slices, you may cut them as thick or thin as you like. Bake them for 12 to 15 minutes, turn them over on their side, and bake them for another 12 to 15 minutes.

Cool, and enjoy!

Origin of BISCOTTO

Italian, biscuit, cookie, from (pane) biscotto, literally, bread baked twice

First Known Use: 1946

Josh's Double Chocolate Biscotti Recipe

Prep time

30 mins

Cook time

35 mins

Total time

1 hour 5 mins

A delightful double-chocolate biscotti cookie recipe, with a dash of facts about biscotti cookies, to further enjoy.

: House of Joyful Noise blog

: Baking

Cuisine: Italian

Serves: ~48 cookies

Ingredients

1 cup of butter, softened
1⅓ cups of sugar
½ of a cup of unsweetened cocoa powder
4 teaspoons of baking powder
4 eggs
3 ½ cups all-purpose flour
½ cup of white chocolate pieces
¼ cup milk, semisweet, or dark chocolate pieces

Instructions

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Lightly grease 2 or more cookie sheets. Beat the softened butter with an electric mixer on medium/high speed for 45 seconds to a minute. Add sugar, cocoa powder, and baking powder. Beat until combined. Beat in the eggs until combined. Beat in flour, “If you can’t beat in all the flour, just stir it in.” Stir in the chocolate pieces.
Divide the dough in fourths: shape into four loaves and put them on the cookie sheets, adjusting the thickness and length of them to fit in the cookie sheet but not bake into each other.
Bake for 25 to 28 minutes or until wood toothpicks inserted near the centers comes out clean. Cool the loaves on cutting boards for 1 to 4 hours. (They slice easier if you let them cool longer and become more firm.)
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Use a serrated bread knife to cut each loaf into slices, you may cut them as thick or thin as you like. Bake them for 12 to 15 minutes, turn them over on their side, and bake them for another 12 to 15 minutes.
Cool, and enjoy!

Be sure to grab the printable recipe, before you go! Hope you enjoy, too!

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Earth Day Cupcakes

April 15, 2011 By Laura 2 Comments

We are so smitten with how our Earth Day cupcakes came out, we like to keep on sharing them with you all.

There are times that the things we creatively do as a family, or the ideas we have, happen ON a holiday or special calendar day. So naturally they do not get blogged until after the fact. Since we like our readers to have the opportunity to take our ideas and find creative inspiration from them, or flat out borrow the ideas, I like to try and share (or re-share) those ideas the following year, so that you all can have time to use them if you’d like, while that day is upcoming once again.

Here in the Recipes section, I thought it would be nice to (re-) share just the photos of the Earth Day Cupcakes that we had so much fun making with the kids last year, on Earth Day following our neighborhood and beach clean-up we did. For any new readers, if you’d like to visit our family’s Earth Day 2010 blog post, you can do so HERE. It was a great day, and I took lots of photos of the kids and our activities that day, so I think you would really enjoy it.

These are simple boxed chocolate cake mix cupcakes. Using canned white canned frosting, we split it up into separate little batches, making various colors with drops of food coloring. The blue ocean base of the earths we just spread on, but most of the rest of the designs were piped on. We are no cake decorating pros, but we sure had fun, and we think they came out cute!

Hope you find yourself inspired!! If not to decorate some cupcakes for Earth Day, at least to eat some!
And to give love and care to our Earth, all year round.

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Origin of BISCOTTO

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