Super yummy lemon yogurt cake

Can't get enough of it, so moist, so yum so so....you just have to eat it. I plan on making this cake again on Tuesday....for those of you coming to SB ;)

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup plain whole-milk yogurt
• 1 1/3 cups sugar, divided
• 3 extra-large eggs
• 2 teaspoons grated lemon zest (2 lemons)
• 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1/3 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice

FOR THE GLAZE 1 cup of confectioners sugar and 2 tablespoons of fresh lemon juice.


Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and grease a rectangular pan, with butter and flour or a spray whatever you want.

Sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt into 1 bowl. In another bowl, whisk together the yogurt, 1 cup sugar,eggs, lemon zest, and vanilla. Slowly incorporate the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. With a rubber spatula, fold the vegetable oil into the batter, making sure it's all incorporated. Pour the batter into the  pan and bake for about 50 minutes.
Meanwhile, cook the 1/3 cup lemon juice and remaining 1/3 cup sugar in a small pan until the sugar dissolves and the mixture is clear. Set aside.
When the cake is done, allow it to cool in the pan for 10 minutes. Carefully place on a baking rack over a sheet pan. While the cake is still warm, pour the lemon-sugar mixture over the cake and allow it to soak in. Cool.
For the glaze, combine the confectioners' sugar and lemon juice and pour over the cake.

ENJOY!
Delfi

Chicken Marsala, OMG

I have tried many chicken marsala recipes and this is the one that I like. It is a combination of many recipes and some tricks of my own. I hope you like it, it's not difficult at all and well my entire family LOVES it, there is usually nothing left.

This time around I made it with garlic mashed potatoes, I have also made it with fettuccini alfredo and it is just as good!

INGREDIENTS

6 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (I used organic, I think it tastes better)
About 1 cup of all purpose flour
Salt and pepper
1/3 cup of olive oil
6-8 slices of fresh prosciutto or bacon (I used fresh bacon from the polish deli)
2 boxes or 12 oz of portabella mushrooms
3/4-1 cup of good red wine
3/4 cups of chicken stock
3 tablespoons of unsalted butter
1/4 cup of fresh chopped parsley

Here we go.
Pound your chicken, not too thin, Id say about 1 to 1 1/2 inches thick.

Put the flour in a plate and season with LOTS of salt and pepper, ok don't go overboard but make sure you add enough to flavor the chicken. Heat the olive oil in a pan at medium to high heat. Dredge the chicken breast in the flour, remove excess flour.

Great, when your oil is hot add the chicken cook about 4-5 minutes on each side.

Remove from pan and put chicken on a plate, don't stack them up.

Lower the heat to medium and add your bacon or prosciutto.

Cook for about a minute or so, scrape the pan and incorporate all those flavors together, now it's starting to smell good. Then add your mushrooms and cook for about 5 minutes, basically until most of the liquid has been evaporated, add some salt and pepper.

Now add your wine and let it cook for a minute or 2 to cook the alcohol. Then add the chicken stock.

Cook for a couple of minutes. Now add the butter.

Return the chicken to the pan, cook for about 4 minutes, without turning, it depends on how thick your chicken is, if it's thin then cook for a couple of minutes without turning, if its thicker then add a couple of minutes, if your chicken does not fit in one pan I usually take another pan, add some of the sauce and mushrooms and cook all the chicken at the same time in 2 pans, works just as well.

Remove, serve HOT and sprinkle some of that parsley!!! that's all there is to it.

I hope you try this dish and enjoy it as much as we do :) My kids will not eat mushrooms so they just eat chicken with mashed potatoes.

HUGS!
Delfi

PW's Make ahead muffin melts

No words can describe how good these were, see them? on the left of that photo? yes...that's how good these are. I didn't come up with it, it's all thanks to this awesome woman I look up to, I follow her blog night and day! The Pioneer Woman.

For the recipe click below, I cannot wait for you to try these!
Make Ahead Muffin Melts


HUGS!
Delfi

Last minute BBQ

So my dear husband decided to BBQ last minute on Sunday, we are all excited but wait what should we throw on the grill, well I had some frozen ground beef so I proceeded to make burgers, for salad I had no greens but I had tomatoes and corn, and a lot of chicken breast so this is what we came up with.

For the salad, chop tomatoes about 3-4 and 1 can of whole kernel corn, add a little salt and pepper.

 For the grill, I have no idea what my husband did to this chicken but it was so juicy and soooo GOOD, my husband never cooks but when he does he is the best! In other words I can only offer a photo of the chicken maybe one day he will give me his secret.

And well ok, I ate this burger. I grabbed whole grain bread, just 1 slice cut in half, topped it with mozzarella cheese and added some of that tomato salad :)

And dessert of course was the cheesecake I made yesterday.

We had fun and good and simple food that tasted delicious and was healthy too, well except for the cheesecake part....

Delfi's cheesecake, you will not regret this (easy way)

This super creamy delicious recipe has been in my house for a few years now, I have decided to share this recipe with all my friends because it truly would be a shame to miss out on this one!
I hope you enjoy it :)
Oh yes, this one is called (easy way) because I decided not to make the crust this time, one of these days I will post the recipe for the crust as well :)

Ingredients
for the filling
1 lb of cream cheese at room temperature
8 oz of sour cream
3 eggs
1 lemon, zested
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
1 cup of sugar
1 pie crust :)

for the sauce

1 pint of fresh strawberries, chopped into small pieces
the juice from 1 lemon
1 1/2 tablespoons of sugar

Preheat oven to 325
In a kitchen aid mixer or a similar mixer, beat the cream cheese at low speed until its smooth and free of lumps.

Add the eggs, one at a time and continue to beat until its all well combined.

Add the sugar little by little until creamy, beat 1-2 minutes at low speed.

Zest your lemon while the sugar is getting all beat up.

Now add your sour cream

Lemon zest

And vanilla extract

Continue mixing at low speed, then stop the mixer and scrape down the sides of the bowl to avoid lumps. Beat for another minute or so and you are ready for the next step.

I am using a crust from the store, this is the one I like when Im feeling lazy and I dont make the crust.

Pour the mix in the crust.

Place the cheesecake in a pan.

Boil some water to cover up at least half of the cheesecake, the part that is covered up by the aluminum foil of course. I suggest you place your cheesecake in the oven and then you pour the water so you don't burn yourself when you move the pan to the oven, that's what works for me.

You can't see the water but I did cover it up half way.
Cook cheesecake for 46 minutes. Remove from oven and let it rest there for 30 minutes. Place cheesecake in the refrigerator for at least 4 hours.

When you decide it's time to eat it you are going to proceed to make the sauce.

Prepare ingredients, be sure your strawberries are all chopped up.

Cook strawberries in a pot for 5 minutes on medium high heat.

Add lemon juice and sugar, mix and let it cook for another 5 minutes.

Remove and let sauce cool

Serve while the sauce its still warm!!!
Mmm enjoy....

Delfi

Refrigerator clean up frittata

mmmmmmmm this is soooo good and easy.
 All you do is take whatever is in your fridge, that half an onion, or the fresh deli ham you bought a week ago, perhaps the red pepper you were supposed to cook 2 days ago or the 3 potatoes that were left from last week, those are basically my ingredients, add 4-5 eggs to it and that's all it takes!

Ingredients:

Whatever you needs to be cooked ;) in my case
3 potatoes peeled and chopped
1 red pepper chopped
1/2 spanish onion chopped
1/2lb of deli ham chopped
5 eggs
salt and pepper to taste
1/2-1 cup of vegetable oil

First chop all your ingredients

Now heat the oil in a pan, when its HOT add the potatoes, you might have to cook this in 2 batches

Cook until golden on high heat and drain in a dish with a paper towel to remove excess oil

When you are done with the potatoes remove oil, leave about 1 tablespoon of it and add rest of ingredients.

Cook until soft, remove and drain in paper towel

in a bowl beat 5 eggs

add potatoes, and rest of ingredients, season to taste, mix well

return to the pan on medium high heat

cook for about 10 minutes or until eggs are not so runny
cover pan with a lid or a flat plate

turn it over without burning yourself

slide fritatta back to pan to cook the other side

And you are done! try this with a fresh salad, it is super delicious!
I hope you enjoy it as much as we all did :)
Delfi

La Ribolitta: by David Rocco

I have been testing some of his recipes and I have to say they are pretty good and super simple to make.
Check out this recipe at David Rocco

Click on his name to see the ingredients, I am changing a few things around such as using tomato paste and tomato sauce, also I made my own broth by boiling 2 vegetable bouillon cubes and I used all white cabbage because I could not get the other one at the store :) you can change it or keep it exactly the same!

Here is what I did.

Gather all ingredients

Chop all your vegetables

Preheat 1 cup of olive oil in a large pot, notice my 2 year old dumped some fresh garlic into my oil, no big deal it will give it a better taste!

saute the onion, garlic, celery and carrot, until they are soft, add the potato, savoy cabbage, black cabbage, tomato puree and beans

 Add the vegetable broth and bring it to a boil. Add the slices of the country-style bread and stir well

 Mix well season with salt and pepper to taste and cook for about 45-55 minutes until cabbage is soft, then eat! I topped mine with parmessan cheese! yum!

Coming up tomorrow, refrigerator leftover frittatas! super good.
HUGS
Delfi