Christmas Queso

I'm not really a fan of queso, and this didn't turn out great but it was because of the cheese we were using and I still found it really good. It's an American thing, though. "Queso" is Spanish for "cheese", not for the cheesy dip that I tried yesterday for a dinner I was hosting...

so try it. See how you like it.

If you've never heard of this, comment below. I'm curious to see how many haven't tried it.

I myself have only had it once. Last night.

Serves 10 or more.

Ingredients

• 12 oz. cheese (I used pre-grated, but it turns out rubbery because of the starch. Either grate by hand, or use a hunk of cheese, roughly 12 oz., to produce the best results)
• 1 can Rotel tomatoes (with jalapenos)
• 1 tomato, chopped

Directions

1. put cheese into med.-size saucepan over medium heat.
2. open can, chop tomato, if not chopped. Once chopped, set aside.
3. once cheese has melted, put in chopped tomatoes, stir until well-mixed.
4. pour in can of tomatoes, minus the can.
5. stir until well-mixed,
6. serve immediately with tortilla chips and

 and happy holidays!

P.S. Yes, I did put this under "toppings" because some of the girls at the dinner put it on their tacos. Doesn't sound very good to me, but as long as they liked it.

Post Review | Microwave Mug Cake

This is just a temporary thing... I'll probably do a few and then stop for good, but these are just in case I ever want to "review" my posts.

Click here to see the original post.

Normally I would have you click on this post's title but I find it kind of a pain when I want to see comments or comment on someone's blog and I can't click on the title because it takes me somewhere else, so this time I decided to embed the link in the post, not "on top" of it.

If you know what I mean.

So, how did I like the microwave mug cake?
I didn't.

It was horrible!

Dry, rubbery, not at all sweet, even though I'd added an extra tablespoon because I had tasted the batter and gone, "ah, not quite right - doesn't taste very sweet to me" and besides, I was making it for a little girl, so I knew she would want it sweet.

Good thing she liked it, because I sure knew I didn't.

When I told Mom she told me she'd never found a recipe she liked - they always turned out to be dry and not very good.

What I wanted was moist. What's a cake - even a mug cake - if it doesn't have a bit of moisture to it?

Same goes for brownies. Can I advise, if you're going to make it from scratch, save yourself the trouble and just get Ghirardelli's mix? It's delicious! In fact, it's basically the same recipe I used when I would make brownies from scratch. And no I'm not being paid - this is 100% my own opinion. It's moist, flavorful, and sweet, with pockets of melted chocolate (chips) here and there. Mmm, makes me want some. I used to not like brownies, but now I do. Good ones, that is.

Not ones some people I know make. Wouldn't touch some of those with a 10' pole and that's saying a lot.

I'll eat mostly everything.

Mostly.

There are a few exceptions, like badly-made - or just plain made - eggs. I don't really like eggs, unless I have bacon to go along with it, to drown out the taste. Sometimes I'm in a mood for eggs, but mostly not. Unless I'm really really hungry and that's once in a blue moon because I can just make myself something.

So, about the microwave mug cake, if I can stop straying from the path like I tend to do.

There I go again.

That kid will eat anything I make and pronounce it good, but I'm a little bit more picky. This tasted vaguely familiar to some brownies I've tasted before, see above. Except mine wasn't as sweet, which made it all the more horrible.

If the bad brownies I've had before pale in comparison to this, something's not right.

What's not right?
Here's a list of aaaaall the things wrong with the recipe I've been discussing.

1. No sweetness
   So it calls for three tablespoons of white sugar. I put in four. Still didn't work. I put in 1/2. Still didn't work. It wasn't bitter, per se, it just wasn't sweet. How to fix it: I would say get a better recipe, but if you don't have any idea where to look, I'd say America's Test Kitchen because Mom recommended one of their mug cake recipes to me and I have yet to try it but if Mom recommends it, how can it go wrong. But if you don't want a different recipe, try adding 6-7 tablespoons of sugar. Sound like a lot? Wait until it's cooked!
   
   (What's the saying? "Don't judge a book by it's cover"? In this case, "don't judge the sweetness by the dough")
2. No dome
   It was more like upside-down flan than a cake. It just went down. It sagged in the middle, the opposite of me. Just kidding, no more jokes. haha. How to fix it: to tell you the truth, I absolutely have no clue. Cook for less time? I wish I knew. I'm not a cook, so LMGTFY. Click it. It won't harm you. Maybe get some laughs out of you, but that's about it.
3. No moisture
   This was like eating flour and water, only harder. More like eating dough. Dough that isn't sweet. I don't know, it was so unlike anything I've ever tasted that I can't find anything to compare it with! So what was wrong with it? It was that you had to use your saliva to break it down. Mug cakes are supposed to break down and almost seem to melt in your mouth! You're not supposed to do the work! How to fix it: Try adding some water to it. I don't know how much, and I don't know if this will work, but when I read the thing about mug cakes in the America's Test Kitchen recipe (hopefully I'll have time to try it and write about it before 2016 - but don't hold me to it), they talked about how all mug cakes they came across were dry. I said to myself, "Exactly!" so they advised (if I remember correctly) adding some water to it. Since this isn't a very big mug cake (though big enough that you can't use a 7 oz. mug, you need something more like 12 oz.), use 2+ tablespoons of water and stir thoroughly before putting it in the microwave. Try it out and see how you like it. If it's still dry, add another 2 or so tablespoons, depending on how dry it is. Practice makes perfect, even if it means wasting ingredients. Try using friends or family as guinea pigs - always works for me. ;)

And I could probably think up some other problems with it if I wanted to but for now I'm going to close up shop and call it a night.

After all, this is only making me hungry and we don't need that.

Post Review | Cookie in a Mug

Click on the post title and it will take you to my original post.

This was really quite nice.

Actually, I'm just a bit embarrassed about this but when I read the recipe it said to put in the yolk and guess what I thought the yolk was.

Not what the yoke actually was, I can tell you that!

No, really, I used -- ok, yes, I did -- the egg white.

*slaps forehead* I felt maybe a little bit dumb when I asked my mom and realized I had...well...gotten it wrong. I always get those two mixed up.

Which is probably why the cookie didn't taste very cookie-like.

The "dough" tasted cookie-dough-like, though!

Also, Mom said you can just use a whole egg if it's single-serving size. Or maybe she just said you could use the whole egg period, I don't know.

I guess I wasn't really listening.

But that is very convenient.

Then you don't have to think up some way to use the egg yolk (no, not the egg white, I really do truly mean the egg yolk).

But I have to say that every time I made it, no matter what I did (cooked it shorter, put some water in, put in oil...ok, I didn't put in oil) it still came out as dry and not at all what cookies should taste like.

So be forewarned.

Also try this. You might like it better than I did.

Salted Caramel Sauce

The best caramel sauce ever! This is definitely a favorite!

Also, this is a very very very short post. Just long enough to post the link and be done.

Really, it was going to be a real post and then I ran out of time so hopefully when I have more time I'll make an actual post out of it.

But for now check out the delicious salted caramel sauce recipe I found on Pinterest!

It's the best.

Promise.

Caramel Milk Tea | gugutree

Admit it.

We've all, at one time or other, had too many teabags on our hands.

And for me, they're normally Lipton tea bags.

See, we make delicious sweet tea and we're not even Southern but it means we're always well-stocked with lots and lots of Lipton's black tea teabags.

Sometimes too well-stocked.

But in the winter, you know that the last thing you're going to want is iced, sweet tea. You know you don't want warm sweet tea, heavens no! You're going to want something warm, sweet, creamy, and delicious.

Good thing is, I've got just the thing!

Ingredients

• 1 Lipton tea bag, black tea
• 1 spoonful white sugar
• 1 spoonful light brown sugar
• about 1/4 cup milk
• about 1/8 cup cream
• 1-2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Directions

1. Steep tea bag 3 min
2. While tea is steeping, in a small pot on stove, mix in
   
   1. vanilla
   2. brown sugar
   3. white sugar
   4. milk
   5. cream
   in that order. Vanilla tends to evaporate very quickly, so you'll need to have the brown sugar ready when you've put in the vanilla. Two teaspoons won't evaporate as quickly as one, and besides, it's yummier that way than with just one. Just trust me.
3. Let mixture in pot simmer and get hot, while on low.
4. Once hot, pour in tea, sipping every couple pours to make sure you like it so far and that it's not too Lipton-tea-y. 
5. Once poured, stir vigorously, allowing tea to be distributed throughout the whole mixture.
6. Pour into mug, and, for a fancier addition, top with whipped cream and salted caramel sauce on the top of the whipped cream. 
7. Serve, and

P.S. to enjoy even more, turn on some soft music, get in some cozy pajamas, get in bed or in front of the fire with your favorite, exciting book. My suggestion is "The Scarlet Pimpernel" -- excitement guaranteed! Also terrific characters *wink wink*. Also be prepared to really like this tea. Enjoy!

P.P.S. hopefully I'll be able to change the blurry photo for something a little more "in focus" to what I had in mind...pun intended. ;)

5 Min or Less: Quick Coffee

Ingredients

• 3-4 drops vanilla extract
• milk (if you use milk instead of cream, but I wouldn't advise it)
• cream, use generously (until light)
• light brown sugar
• hot water, medium amount
• instant coffee, medium amount (about 1-2 spoons)
• nesquik, to taste

Directions

1. Put coffee in mug, pour hot water over coffee
2. Mix all ingredients together and

P.S. Once done, the coffee should be sweet, creamy, coffee-cocoa like. It should taste like coffee and cocoa. And this recipe was on a slip of paper, very vague, without any measurements so all measurements are my very own. I'm guessing, here.
P.P.S. This makes the 15th coffee recipe! Aren't we loaded... or about to be!

Lipton Latte

Today I made tea.

Which isn't unusual, I make tea all the time.

But I wanted a different sort of tea and I found one!

I don't remember what I looked up on Google but I had told someone that I would make them tea that was different and had a "secret ingredient". It was vanilla. That was what I was planning on. What I wasn't planning on was making something like this!

Though let me just tell you right now so you won't be disappointed later on: this is like every normal tea except it has a different taste. But just barely. It's good though, try it, see how you like it.

Anyway, click here for the original. I made the "tea latte" but I'm calling it "Lipton Latte" because that sounds better. And I'm thinking of making the "milk tea the british way" because I'm curious to see how that turns out!

Here's the original recipe:

1. Add the teabag of your choice to a cup.

2. Boil water, then pour over the teabag.

3. Let the tea steep for at least 5 minutes to get the strongest flavor possible.

4. While your tea is brewing, heat a half cup of milk either by microwaving for 45 seconds (settings vary between machines) or by heating in a pan until it’s steaming.

5. Transfer the hot milk to a jug, and use a milk frother to get that extra-fluffy, foam effect. The desired amount should be about ½ inch thick on top of the milk.

6. Remove the infuser or teabag from your cup and pour in the milk.

7. Add an optional dash of honey or sugar for extra sweetness.

Here's my recipe:

Serves: 1-4

Time: 3-5 min

Ingredients

•  2 teabags (I use Lipton black tea)
• 4 spoons sugar, white
• 4-6 drops vanilla (extract, I believe...Kirkland brand)
• 1 pint water, hot (I use a little more...more like 3-4 cups)
• 1/2 cup milk
• 2 dashes milk (dashes as in I poured a little bit in, two times)

Directions

1. pour hot water over tea bags, steep 3-5 min (I steeped it 3 min, because I didn't have the recipe, but someone had already thrown the tea bag away when I came back to add 2 minutes to it...too bad)
2. heat milk for 1 min in microwave, froth with milk frother, whisk, or hand mixer. Milk froth should be about 1/2 inch high. 
3. pour hot milk into tea, leaving behind froth (I didn't mean to...but I was using the thing for gravy, as seen two posts ago -- the-directions-the-way-I-did-them #6) for later.
4. put cream, sugar, and vanilla in tea. The tea should be a light tan now. If not, stir the milk in so that it is. Stir until cream and vanilla is distributed, and the sugar is dissolved.
5. spoon froth on top, sprinkling either white sugar or brown sugar on top for decoration, serve immediately and