Merry Christmas!

I hope you are enjoying this holiday season. We have so much snow its easy to feel the christmas spirit! This year all of my kids are going to be home for Christmas and even some of the grandkids. I don't want to miss out on any of the fun Christmas morning, so I am going to prepare breakfast the night before. (I am putting this recipe on this blog and in my newsletter just because it is such a great recipe!) It is so nice to use a make ahead breakfast recipe. Besides I don't think Christmas morning I would have to many helpers.
Baked Apple French Toast with Carmel Sauce
1 loaf French bread, sliced in 1 ½ inch slices
6 eggs
1 ½ cups milk
½ cup sugar
1 T. vanilla
6 med. Apples, peeled and sliced ( fuji, Jonathon, or granny smith)
1 ½ tea. Ground cinnamon
½ tea. Ground nutmeg
3 T. packed brown sugar
1 recipe Caramel Sauce (below)

The night before serving, coat a 9 x 13 baking dish with nonstick cooking spray. Layer
Bread slices on the bottom of the pan. Combine eggs, milk, sugar, and vanilla in a large bowl; beat well and pour over bread slices. Place apple slices on top of bread. Sprinkle apples with cinnamon, nutmeg, and brown sugar. Cover with foil and refrigerate over night. In the morning, preheat oven to 350 degrees. Bake covered about 50 minutes, remove foil and bake 10 minutes more. Makes 8 to 10 servings.

Caramel Sauce
½ cup packed brown sugar
¼ cup flour
½ cup butter, melted
½ cup milk
2 T. vanilla

Combine all ingredients in a med. saucepan and cook over med. heat until thick, stirring constantly.

Enjoy!
Merry Christmas!
Debbie

Merry Christmas!

Here to Quick!

Does anyone else agree this year has flown by! I can't believe we are 9 days away from Christmas. I am almost ready, I just have a few more gift to get and I will be done. And then I start on all the gifts from my kitchen. I really enjoy that part. I am doing alot of the Mixes in a Jar so thats what I am sharing with you! This one is a soup.
Texas 2 Step Soup
1 (1.61-ounce) package brown gravy mix (regular or no-fat)
2 tablespoons mild red chili powder
2 teaspoons dried oregano leaves
1 teaspoon ground cumin (optional)
1 teaspoon dried minced onion
1/2 teaspoon garlic salt
10 to 12 regular-size tortilla chips, coarsely crushed
1 to 1 1/4 cups uncooked small to medium-size pasta (such as wheels, shells, macaroni)
Pour gravy mix into wide-mouth pint jar. In small bowl, stir together chili powder, oregano, cumin, onion and garlic salt. Pour into jar to make second layer. Add layers of tortilla chips and pasta to fill jar. Seal with lid. Attach gift tag with preparation instructions and decorate jar as desired.
Gift Tag: Brown 1/2 pound ground beef in a large saucepan or Dutch oven. Add contents of jar and 7 cups water; heat to boiling. Stir in 1 (15-ounce) can corn with red and green bell peppers and 1 (16-ounce) can chopped tomatoes. Reduce heat; cover and simmer for 20 to 25 minutes or until pasta is tender, stirring occasionally. Serve with additional crushed tortilla chips and shredded Monterey Jack cheese, if desired. Makes 8 servings.

Another "Mix in a Jar" Recipe

I am loving the "Mix in a Jar" recipes. I think they make great gifts. If you are in Utah, I went over to Roberts our local craft store and got the cutes jars with gingerbread guys on top to do my mixes in. They are are on sale right now so they aren't to expensive.
I did a few of the following:

Chocolate Chip Coffeecake Mix
You will need a 1 one-quart wide-mouth jar. The wide mouth makes it easier to layer.
1 and 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup chocolate chips
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans
In a medium bowl, sift the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Pour flour mixture into the jar.Layer the following ingredients on top of the flour mixture: brown sugar, chocolate chips and chopped nuts.Put on lid and seal the jar.

I like to make a recipe card to attach to the jar their cooking instructions on it.
Chocolate Chip Coffeecake
1 jar Chocolate Chip Coffeecake Mix
· 3 large eggs
· 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter - softened
· 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
· 1 cup sour cream
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Prepare a 12" x 12" (or similar) baking pan with a generous coating of cooking spray.In a large bowl, beat the eggs, butter and vanilla extract together until well-blended. Add the coffee cake mix and sour cream and mix until well blended.Pour the batter into the prepared pan. Bake 25 to 35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into center comes out clean. Serves 12.
Allow coffee cake to cool at least 10 minutes before cutting or eating.

Black Friday!

Hello,
I know its been a while since my last post, but I had a week off to get ready for Thanksgiving and to figure out the shopping plan for "Black Friday". I hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving! And you all had left overs to make some of those delious recipes all the cooking shows showed us for weeks before.
"Black Friday".....hum .... well I know why it has its name! We got up at 3:30 am to make sure we were at Kohls bright and early. They opened at 4:00 am. We are driving there and get there about 10 minutes early..... and the line has already formed and goes down the complex past the other 4 stores and around the corner! So I took it we were late....Dang! And it was raining! So we waited until they opened the doors and slowly push our way thru with everyone else. I went one way and my Daughter went the other. You know divide and conquer! I ran to the back of the store to get the great deal on Kitchenade knife sets just to find out the store only put out 4 of them and the first 2 ladies back there each got 2. Oh well after all we didn't stand in the rain for 2 hours before the store opened so they deserved them! We did grab a few things and then stood in line for 30 minutes. On to the next store!!
We arrived at JC Penney's just in time to get the 4 inch snow globe they were giving away!! Score! We found several things to buy at great prices! And went on to Walmart.....
Now that was ZOO! And anyone in there right mind should never go there on "Black Friday".
But then again we were still half asleep. We were excited to find that they did really stock the door busters that were advertized! We found palletts of great buys! I love when a store really plans for this sale. After doing more shopping we headed for the craft stores! Have you noticed that at christmas everything they carry is just what you need ( or really want). We were now hungry and very tired so home we went for left over turkey sandwiches!! And a Nice nap! We really deserved it after that long day! And now all we have to do is wrap all of those gifts!!