Non-Adventure # 14 /Rambling #10 Titus 2 Women Food and Fellowship

Towards the end of the summer Julie Speck (a lady in my church) asked me if I would like to do this Bible Study that she was going to run on Tuesday nights at her house. I was missing BSF and decided that yes I was interested. So on Tuesday nights we started meeting at her house and discussing our answers. This is the name of the study that we did (its the cover of our little book):
And here is (most) of our little group with Julie (middle, back row, pink shirt)
We are a group that ranged from single, to engaged to, to married. Some of us had children, some didn't, and one of us has a grandchild (who is the cutest thing ever!). I learned a lot from this study and as always when you self reflect there are times when its a little tough but it was neat to get that advice and conversation with those girls. We always seemed to have a really good time and I am glad to say I made some new friends and reconnected with some old ones. As an added bonus we were lead by such a wonderful woman named Julie. I enjoyed hearing her answers and thoughts too. So thank you Julie for inviting me to participate in this study!

Well Tuesday (the 6th) was our last night of discussion, so we decided to meet a little early and have dinner together. Julie made chicken and rice for Chicken Sundaes. The rest of the girls brought the toppings: cherry tomatoes, almonds, pineapple chunks, chow mein noodles, chopped celery, coconut, olives, and grated cheese. It sounds like it might be disgusting and I would have been the first to tell you I thought the same thing, but crazily enough the more you loaded/mixed with the chicken and rice the better it tasted. I signed up to bring Beverly's Grape Salad (BSF leader from last year) and to share making a dessert with Dedra. She brought Hershey Bar Pie and I brought a Strawberry Pie with fresh whipped cream. So the recipes I am adding are the Grape Salad and the pie and whipped cream. So here we go.

Beverly's Grape Salad

The ingredients grapes (red, green, or both), cream cheese, sour cream, sugar, brown sugar, vanilla, and nuts (these can be optional, but they are soooo good with it).

I think its easier to put it in a food processor but you must be careful to not be too crazy with it.

So in the food processor I combined the cream cheese and the sour cream and pulsed to mix.
Then I added a 1/2 cup of sugar and a tsp of vanilla, and pulsed a little more
Then I took my grapes that I had washed, dried, and pulled of the stems
and poured the mixture in the food processor over it and stirred to coat all the grapes.
then I added 2 tablespoons of brown sugar
and a very healthy cup of crushed or chopped nuts (I think I did walnuts because it's what we already had) and stir to coat and mix in.
Just chill a little while before eating! Trust me it's sooooo yummy!
Now it's time for the:

Strawberry Pie

I started with my graham cracker crust. Here are the ingredients that I used for that they are graham cracker crumbs (I cheated and used already crunched up graham crackers), butter, and sugar.

Preheat the oven to 350. First I melted the butter in the microwave and then added the sugar to the melted butter and gave it a stir.
then I added the butter/sugar to the crumbs and mixed with a fork till all the crumbs seemed coated and it looked like wet sand.

Then I poured it in to a 9 inch pie plate
and using my fingers I pushed it up on the sides and across the bottom making sure to try and get it as even as possible. (You can also use a measuring cup to push down the crust)
like so. Then I put it in the oven for about 7 minutes to firm up and then let it cool on a wire rack.
Now the pie filling:
the ingredients: fresh strawberries (hulled), sugar, cornstarch, and strawberry jello.

First I washed and hulled the strawberrys and this time for this pie I halved the strawberrys. Then I added the sugar and conrstarch and gave it a good stir to mix it up.

Next I boiled some water and when it was a bubblin' I added the sugar/constarch mix and let it cook on medium till it thickened up.
I removed it from the heat and added the Jello and stirred till it had dissolved completely.

Next place the strawberries how you would like them in the cooled pie crust. Here is how I did mine this time.
Then pour the mix on and cover the strawberries pretty well
So it looks like so. Then refrigerate for at least 2 hours.
I have also done my strawberries standing like this:
Here they are chilling in the fridge the salad and the pie ready for dinner at Julie's
Now for the BEST part the fresh whipped cream. This is sooooooo easy you will wonder why you ever bought whipped cream in the first place.

Whipped Cream

Here is all that you need: heavy whipping cream (near milk and creamers), vanilla, and sugar.
Pour 1 cup cold heavy whipping cream into a mixer (it does work best to chill the whisk and bowl in the freezer for like 5 minutes)
Add 1 teaspoon vanilla
and 1/2 cup sugar
and mix on high (kitchenaid about a 6 to an 8)
until stiff peaks form
This is soooooooo easy and extremely yummy!
Allright here are you recipes in detail:

Bev's Grape Salad

1 (8 oz) pkg of cream cheese
1 (8 oz.) container of sour cream
4 lbs of grapes, washed and off stem
1/2 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1 generous cup of desired nut, chopped or crushed

Wash, dry and pull grapes off the stems. Mix together cream cheese, sour cream, and sugar. Then add the vanilla. In a large bowl add the cream cheese mix to the prepared grapes, stir to generously coat. Add the brown sugar and nuts, and stir to combine. Chill for an hour or two before serving.

Strawberry Pie

1 graham cracker crust
1 pkg (5 cups) fresh strawberries, washed and hulled (sliced if desired)
1/2 cup water, boiling
1/2 cup sugar
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1 (3 oz) pkg of strawberry JELLO
fresh whipped cream if desired

Wash and hull strawberries, and slice if desired. Mix together constarch and sugar and stir together. Boil water and add constarch mixture. Cook on medium until mixture begins to thicken. Remove from heat and stir in JELLO dissolving completely. Let cool to room temperature. While cooling arrange strawberries in graham cracker crust in pattern desired. Pour cornstarch mixture over strawberries coating them evenly. Chill in fridge at least 2 hours.

Graham Cracker Crust

1 1/4 cup graham cracker crumbs
1/3 cup (5 tbsps) butter
1/2 cup sugar

Preheat oven to 350. Melt butter, stir in sugar. Pour into crumbs and stir until all coated and the mixture resembles wet sand. Pat into a 9 inch pie plate, covering sides and bottom. Bake in oven for 6-8 minutes. Let cool on a wire rack.

Whipped Cream

1 cup cold heavy whipping cream
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup sugar

In a chilled mixing bowl, add whipping cream, vanilla, and sugar. Mix on high (6-8 on a kitchen aid) until it forms stiff peaks. Refrigerate until serving.

Non-Adventure #13 & Rambling #9 Sunday Dinner #2 An Old Fave and a New Treat!

So I made dinner again and I wanted to make something that everyone in my family loves, including my dad. My sister discovered it in college ad brought it home to all of us. We like to call it Spaghetti Bake. It's really simple, super easy and tastes even better the next day. These are the ingredients:

Ground beef (or ground turkey), spaghetti noodles, spaghetti sauce (1-2 depending on the jar size, this is the giant jar and I only needed the one), 2 (smaller) packages of shredded pizza cheese. Preheat the oven to 350.
Brown and drain the beef. Make sure it's in little chunks (my mom uses a potato masher to break it up). Set aside to cool down a little.
Boil water and add about this many noodles. I like to break mine in half .
After your meat is cooked and noodles are done, drained, and rinsed with cold water. Make sure to drain off as much water as possible. In a 13x9 glass baking dish use about half the noodles to make a layer. Completely cover the bottom of the dish.
Using half the browned meat, sprinkle a layer on top of the noodles.
Use one jar (or if using a BIG JAR about half of that one) and pour on top of the meat and spread around with a spatula.
Use one of the first packages of cheese and sprinkle on top of the sauce.
Use the remaining ingredients to repeat the layers. (Rest of the noodles, meat, sauce, and last package of cheese, so it looks like this below)
Bake in the oven for 35-40 minutes. (you can use the broiler to brown it up a little)
I know it will be hard because it will smell AMAZING! but wait about 5 minutes before cutting into it to serve.
This is soooooooo good and like I said earlier I think it's even better the next day! Just cut you a chunk and heat it up in the microwave.

And now for dessert! I made a recent new purchase the other day. It is this cookbook:
This is a great cookbook for anyone really but especially good for a beginner. It has skill levels and step by step pictures. At the bottom of every page is a box called "Ask mom" and it gives you page numbers to find the answers to questions that you would probably call mom to ask her. I am the kind of person who reads cookbooks like actual books and this I LOVE!!!

So I decided to make the fudgy brownies. I have only ever made them from a mix and so I was kind of excited to make them from scratch. Here are the ingredients:
Flour, sugar, butter, baking soda, vanilla, unsweetened chocolate, eggs, and nuts (the nuts are optional)
Preheat the oven to 350.
They say to use a chef's knife to coarsely chop 3 oz. of unsweetened chocolate (I used my little chopper from Pampered Chef to coarsely chop the chocolate).
In a saucepan, on low melt 1/2 cup of butter and the coarsely chopped chocolate until smooth and melted. Remove from heat. While it's cooling prepare an 8x8 baking dish or pan with nonstick spray.
When the chocolate is cooled add 1 cup of sugar, and stir until its dissolved.
Now don't follow me exactly here I kind of messed up but add one egg at a time and stir vigorously after each addition, making sure they are incorporated.
Then stir in 1 teaspoon of vanilla.
In a small bowl stir together 2/3 cups of flour and 1/4 teaspoon baking soda. Add the flour mixture to the chocolate mixture and stir just until combined.

If you want them stir in 1/2 cup chopped nuts.
Spread the mixture evenly into the prepared pan.

Bake in the preheated oven for 30 minutes.
Someone attacked mine before we even sat down to dinner.
It was a really easy recipe and a great book of recipes. I can't wait to make some more. They also have another one called Anyone can cook. I have not purchased that one but I bet it's just as good as the baking one and it comes with a dvd!
Like before here are the recipes written out:

Spaghetti Bake
1 lb of ground beef (or ground turkey)
1 box of spaghetti noodles
2 jars (or one BIG JAR) of spaghetti sauce
2 packages (small ones) of shredded pizza cheese

Preheat oven to 350. Brown and drain ground meat. Cook noodles. In 13x9 baking dish layer half of the noodles, half of the meat, half of the sauce (spread around), and one package of shredded cheese. Repeat the layers using the rest of the ingredients. Bake for 35-40 min in the preheated oven. Cool for 5 minutes and scarf down!

Fudgy Brownies
1/2 cup butter
3 oz. unsweetened chocolate, coarsely chopped
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
2/3 cups flour
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 cup chopped nuts

In medium saucepan on low melt butter and chocolate, remove from heat. Prepare 8x8 pan with non-stick spray. Once cooled stir in sugar. Add eggs one at a time and stir vigorously until incorporated. Stir in vanilla. In a small bowl stir together flour and baking soda. Add flour mixture to chocolate mixture, mixing until just combined. If desired stir in nuts. Pour into prepared pan and spread evenly. Bake for 30 minutes and then cool on a wire rack.