Courtzilla Cooks

The Best Birthday Cake

2010-06-27T13:01:00.000-05:00

Time to get serious. Two cake layers. Double the frosting. Mass amounts of sprinkles. This cake was for my roommate Aly, but I'm posting in celebration of someone else's birthday... MINE! I'm hoping you'll make me one of these. Deal? Birthday's July 9th... you know in case you were wondering.

Recipe yoinked from Deb over at Smitten Kitchen

You'll need:
- 2 9" cake pans, can be round, square - whatever strikes your fancy.
- 4 cups plus 2 tablespoons cake flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
- 2 cups sugar
- 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 4 large eggs
- 2 cups buttermilk

Alrighty! First you'll want to butter and flour your pans. Grease up the pans with a bit of butter, then pour a small bit of flour in the pan. Shake it around until the whole pan is covered with flour, then shake out the excess. Should look like this....

Ok! Now, mix together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a bowl.

In another larger bowl, beat together the butter and sugar until fluffy, and then add the vanilla.

Add your eggs one at a time. Make sure you scrape the sides of the bowl down after each egg, so we can guarantee it's all been mixed together perfectly. After that, slowly add your buttermilk until just combined. Then you can add you flour in 3 batches, beating after each batch. Make sure you stir/beat it until it's just mixed together. If you over beat the flour you can wind up beating out the moisture from the cake. What's the point of cake without moisture? Oh wait, frosting. I forgot.

Pour the batter into your cake pans, and put them in a 350 degree oven for 35 to 40 minutes.

VOILA!

Alrighty. Now in order to stack these so they line up and don't look like a soccer ball, we have to cut off the rounded tops. I think it's easiest to do this once they've cooled with a big knife while they are still in the pan. That way you get perfect measurements, and the two cakes will line up perfectly.

Now, take on half of your cake, and spread frosting on the top of it. Let's be honest here - I got lazy and bought frosting in a can. SO SUE ME.

Now turn the other half of the cake upside down, and plop it down ever-so-gracefully on top.

Here's another trick for you, slide 3 pieces of parchment or wax paper under the cake, so none of the rim of the cake touches the plate/counter. That way when you're done frosting you can pull away the parchment, and it won't make a mess. THANKS MARTHA STEWART YOU'RE THE BEST. Don't even act like you don't watch her show religiously.

An easy way to frost a cake is to put a "crumb layer" of frosting on first. Just a thin layer that will hold down all the crumbs so they don't peel off and get everywhere.

We're going for function here, not beauty.

Now, get the rest of the frosting on there. Lay it on reallll thick. Like sarcasm.

Sprinkles anyone?

Ta daaaa! Aren't you impressed? Now you can pipe your favorite roommate's name on top. Apparently I need to work on my piping skills. Pull away the parchment paper at the bottom, and you are ready to throw a birthday party.

I'll be expecting my cakes no later than the 8th of July.

Enjoy!!

<3<3Courtzilla

Stromboli

2010-04-17T12:18:00.001-05:00

Stromboli! It's a recent discovery of mine. A discovery in the best sense of the word. It's like a JJ's italian night club rolled up in a hard to spill dough blanket. Best description ever?

Fact: this is delicious.

You'll need:

- some italian meat. I used genoa salami and pepperoni, but feel free to use fancier stuff if you feel like it.
- provolone cheese
- parmesan cheese
- italian seasoning, garlic powder, and red pepper flakes
- a can of pillsbury italian bread (you can use pizza dough too!)
- some flour to roll it out
- sauteed peppers? carmelized onions? italian sausage? possibilities are endless.

Alrighty! First things first, scatter some flour on your counter. This thing is going to get sticky. I put a piece of parchment paper down because I live with 2 boys and you never know what's going to be on the counter. Better safe than sorry.

Now, roll out your dough so it's roughly in a rectangle shape. Pinch together any holes or thin spots - you don't want delicious filling flying all over your oven, trust me.

Now... layering! Throw down one of your meats first... in my case the genoa salami. Try to leave a 1" border of dough around the filling, it'll be easier to pinch together at the end if you do that.

Alrighty, now you'll want to sprinkle on some Italian seasoning, and the red pepper flakes. Amount is up to you. I went pretty heavy on the Italian seasoning, next time I'll probably cut this down by at least a third.

Now I put a layer of the cheese down. I broke the provolone in half so it would be easier to roll up.

Add on some scattered pepperoni...

Sprinkle some grated parmesan on there...

Alright, now we're getting serious. Rolling time. Start at one of the long edges and start to roll up the dough, pinching the edges at the end together as you go. This will seal in the goodness during the baking process. When you're done, it should look like a long log.

Kinda ugly looking ain't it?

Pinch the seam shut, and place it seam side down on a baking sheet.

Oook. Now I melted some butter and brushed it across the top to get a nice brown and crusty edge in the oven. Sprinkle some more parmesan on top, along with some garlic powder and more Italian seasoning if you're feeling rebellious.

Looking better looking better...

Throw your dough log in a 350 degree oven, for about 25-30 minutes. Really all you need to cook is the bread so check your packaging for exact measurements.

It'll come out lookin' something like this:

Haha what a horrendous picture.

Slice up the stromboli, should make about 8 or so 1.5" thick pieces. Check it out!

So good. Serve it with your favorite marinara or pasta sauce and you're good to go! It's just as good cold, too.

Clearly, I hated mine.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Spring Cranberry Salad

2010-04-13T11:26:00.001-05:00

Want to impress your friends? Want to say, "Yo, check out this complicated and fancy lookin' salad?" I mean, who doesn't want to say that, really. This is your salad. It's deceivingly simple, but your friends will think you're a bona fide Martha Stewart.

You'll need:

- 1 head of romaine, or a spring greens mix
- a handful of dried cranberries
- some chopped up celery, about 1 or 2 stalks
- 2 shallots
- some crumbled goat cheese
- poppy seed dressing, the creamier, the better

First, wash and tear up your romaine into bite sized pieces. Or dump a bag of spring mix in a bowl. Do you enjoy how I give you options?

Now we want to caramelize the shallots to make them really sweet. Saute them up into smallish pieces, and put them in a saute pan over medium heat. They don't need any oil or anything, their natural sugars will start to sweat out and make everything realll tasty like.

While those are browning up nicely, we can start assembling the salad. You'll want to add the celery, and the goat cheese for some tang.

Couple of handfuls of cranberries right on top...

And now add the caramelized shallots...

If you want at this point you can add some DELICIOUS candied walnuts or pecans, but who has time to candy their own pecans? Plus, those suckers are EXPENSIVE.

Pour on some scrumptious poppy seed dressing...

And bada boom bada bing you're in business. Not too shabby for about 10 minutes work, eh?

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Texas Chocolate Sheet Cake

2010-04-11T10:41:00.002-05:00

Texas sheet cake. Why do they call it "Texas" sheet cake? I have no idea. One thought is that it may be called that because it makes enough cake to feed the entire state of Texas. I wish I was kidding. Might want to halve this recipe unless you're planning on going up a pant size.

What you'll need:
- 2 cups of flour
- 2 cups of sugar
-1/4 tsp salt
- 4 heaping tablespoons of cocoa. If you're feeling fancy use the dutch process fancy pants kind. If you're me use Hershey's.
- 1/2 tablespoon instant coffee grounds
- 1/2 cup buttermilk
- 1 cup boiling water
- 2 beaten eggs
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 sweet dinosaur cupcake pan (optional)

Let's get crackin.

First things first, boil your water so it's ready to go. Simple enough.

Ballin'. Alrighty, now in a mixing bowl stir together your flour, sugar and salt.

Here's where things get serious. Melt TWO sticks of butter in a medium sized pot. Oh, be still my heart.

To the melted butter, add your cocoa and coffee. Quirky fact: adding instant coffee to your chocolate cake/chocolate chip cookies will make Hershey's cocoa taste more rich. See? Learning all kinds of things today aren't we.

Now, add the boiling water to the chocolate/butter mixture.

Take a sniff. Die a little.

Let this boil for about 30 seconds, then turn off the heat. Pour the chocolate on top of your flour, and stir to combine. You'll want to hang out a bit and let that cool down.

Forgive my yellow bowl, it does not realize what it does to pictures.

While that's cooling off, measure out your buttermilk in a measuring cup. Add the baking soda, vanilla and eggs and whisk it around to combine.

If your flour/chocolate has cooled down enough, mix it together with the buttermilk mixture. Make sure it's cool though, or else you'll wind up with scrambled eggs, and I'm sorry, but scrambled egg chocolate sheet cake just doesn't have the same ring to it.

Pour this onto a sheet pan and bake at 350 degrees for about 20 minutes. I don't have a sheet pan with rims that high, so I used my trusty 9 x 13" pan. NBD.

After I got the batter into that pan, I realized... I still have a ton of batter left. There's only one reasonable solution to such a problem.

DINOSAUR CUPCAKES. I'm sorry, but just bask in the glory of this awesome pan. Are you jealous you don't have one??!??!

You could make a frosting for this cake, but why? It's honestly so moist and so rich, just a dusting of powdered sugar will do. Make sure the cake is completely cool though, or else the powdered sugar will just melt into the cake.

Delicious. As for the dino cupcakes?

I had no problem getting rid of those.

Ahahahhaa. I love that pan.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Slow Cooked BBQ Pulled Pork

2010-03-19T11:31:00.000-05:00

Don't you love a recipe that takes like 15 minutes of actual cooking? Say hello to pulled pork. Throw it in the crock pot with minimal seasoning, and watch 2 movies on a hungover Saturday while it fills your house with a crazy delicious (Dr. Pibb + Redvines?) scent. Don't believe me? Give this a try.

What you'll need...
-A cut of pork. Either pork butt, or pork shoulder. The idea is lowww and sloowwww so the tougher, cheaper meats will break down and get realll tender. You'll need about 2-3 ish pounds.
-1 small yellow onion
-3 tablespoons worcestershire sauce. I hate both spelling, and saying that word for the record.
-water
-About 4-6 buns
-1/2 a bottle of your favorite bbq sauce - I used Sweet Baby Ray's... it's necessary.

Alrighty! Roughly chop up your onion and lay it on the bottom of the crock pot.

Place the pork on top of the onions. I got some sort of weird cut that was on sale, but it turned out delicious. Go ahead and add the worcestershire sauce.

Fill the crock pot full of water so it's fully covering the pork. Our crock pot is kind of small... so stop making fun of the dry pork. I'm not as perfect as I may come across on paper.

I added some paprika and cumin, because I can't leave things alone. It's not necessary though.

OK! You're ready to go. Put the setting on low, and leave it alone. For .... six hours. SIX HOURS. You could go to work and just let this bubble away, then come home to tender, delicious pulled pork. Here's what it looks like when it's done....

I pick out the pork and shred it, discarding the onions.

I find it easiest to use two forks. It's so easy since it's falling apart on it's own anyway. Mix the shredded pork with the BBQ sauce. I only use about 1/2 the bottle, or else I think it gets too soupy and over powers the pork.

COME GETCHA SOME. Let it cook away on low for about another hour, stirring occasionally so the pork doesn't stick to the sides.

Who loves me? My roommates, that's who.

Throw it on a bun, maybe top it with some coleslaw or just leave it plain.

Either way, it's scrumptious!!

Jealous much?

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

French Toast Casserole

2010-03-17T20:38:00.005-05:00

So you might be wondering... just fruit before a full day of drinking? That's what I thought too... ludicrous. We need something of substance!

I made this recipe, had one bite, and was hooked. It's easy, portable, and you can make it the night before so it doesn't get in the way of your horrible drinking habits. Sounds like my kind of recipe.

Here's what you'll need:

-a loaf of french bread or challah bread, cubed
-1/2 cup of butter
-1 cup of brown sugar
-1 tsp of cinnamon
-1.5 cups of milk
-5 eggs

First things first, cube up your french bread. It'll make a mess using the good crusty bread, but it absorbs so much more of the egg mixture that you'll definitely want to just go for it.

Butter up a 9 x 13 ish inch pan.

Place half of your bread in the bottom of the pan.

Mix together the brown sugar and cinnamon, then sprinkle half of it over the bread layer.

Layer the last of the bread on top of that, then sprinkle the rest of the sugar mix on the very top.

Measure out the milk in your measuring cup, add in the 5 eggs and the vanilla extract directly into the measuring cup

andddd WHISK

Now pour this all over top of the casserole.

Cover with tin foil or plastic wrap and let it sit and soak overnight. The next day, just pop it in a 350 degree oven for 30 minutes. Take it out and uncover, then cook for an additional 15 minutes to brown up the top. Hollllyyyy cow. Serve it with some maple syrup. Die.

I don't have the sweet finished product because we went and ate it too fast. But let's just say...this picture sums it up.

Sorry John, I had to.

Happy St. Patty's day!

<3
Courtzilla

Balsamic Fruit Salad

2010-03-04T23:02:00.004-06:00

Simple, easy, fast, delicious, and healthy. Is there a better way to start off an entire day of drinking?? Today starting at dawn is U of Illinois' Unofficial, a crazy celebration centered around green shirts and a free for all drunk fest. The best times to see it are from 8am to about 2 am when everyone passes out, then ralleys at 8pm to go at it again. The breakfast of champions usually includes kegs and eggs, and to throw probably the only fruit or vegetable these people are going to eat all day, I made some fruit salad!

This ain't your grandma's fruit salad. It's got a couple unique twists.

You'll need:

-1 case of strawberries (is that a pint? i have no idea)
- 2 smallish things of blueberries
- 1 smallish thing of raspberries.
- 1/4 cup of white sugar
- 2 Tablespoons of aged balsamic vinegar
- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper - sounds weird, but TRUST me

Man I sound so technical today. Smallish thing? I hope you guys know what I'm talking about.

Alright first off wash all your fruit, cut up the strawberries, and combine it in a medium sized bowl.

Add the sugar...

Add the balsamic vinegar and pepper....

Mix... and VOILA!!

You are instantly a gourmet chef! This is good if you let it sit for like an hour for the sugar in the fruit to break down... it's even BETTER if you leave it over night. It makes this transcendant syrup... holy cow. Know what this syrup could take the place of? Grenadine. Helloooo tequila sunrises. Delicious, and so easy!

Have a safe Unofficial, you nuts.

Enjoy!

Courtzilla

Throw It In Lasagna

2010-02-09T00:38:00.007-06:00

I have a weakness. Not many people are aware of it, but I'm going to share it now. I....I....I love Italian food. You shove a plate of pasta in front of me and I'll pretty much do anything you want. Which is why when I made this, I proceeded to make a lasagna big enough to serve 12. I currently have 6 pieces in my freezer. Hello, lover.

This lasagna is not authentic by any means, but it's pretty easy, and pretty dang scrumptious. You won't have to pick up too many ingredients for this one - most of the fixin's are pretty standard pantry items if you cook at all. Shall we get started?

You'll need:

-1lb ground beef (or turkey)
-1lb ground pork (or italian sausage)
-couple cloves of garlic
-oven-ready lasagna noodles
-2 cans tomato paste (the lil' guys)
-2 cans whole tomatoes (or diced tomatoes...or stewed tomatoes...or fresh tomatoes...are you seeing what I mean by throw it in lasagna?)
-italian seasoning, or whatever you have on hand (basil, parsley, oregano)
-about 14 slices of mozzarella cheese (or grated cheese...)
- 3 cups of cottage cheese (or ricotta cheese - just as delicious!)
- 2 eggs
- 1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese, then more for the top of the lasagna

Let's get assembling.

First, preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Start browning your meat over medium-high heat in a large skillet. Throw in the garlic too to get that flavor cookin'.

In the meantime, we can make the cheese layer! In a large bowl, mix together 1/2 cup of parmesan cheese, 3 cups cottage cheese, 2 beaten eggs, and 2 teaspoons of italian seasoning.

Now MIX!

It's that easy folks.

At this point your meat mixture should be browned, so go ahead and add the tomatoes, tomato paste, a pinch of salt and 4 tablespoons of Italian seasoning. I used 2 tablespoons of parsley, 1 tablespoons of oregano, and because I'm obsessed with fennel seed, 1 tablespoon of that. Makes it taste reallll Italian-like. Mix it all together until they get to know each other.

Assembly time!

First, you need a layer of noodles. Just a heads up, I used a 9x13 pan for this. It makes a TON of lasagna, but you can freeze it so no worries.

Then, lay down 1/2 your cottage cheese mixture. Try and get it pretty even, unlike this crap job I did. No big deal guys.

Now, lay out your cheese slices/shredded cheese. It'll use about 7 slices on each layer. I only had 10 slices total. Way to count, Courtzilla. Watch how I epically messed this up.

Oh it get's better, wait til the next cheese layer.

Then, meat layer! Use about 1/2 of your meat-y tomato-y goodness.

Now, repeat! Noodles...

Cottage cheese...

Mozzarella layer... with shredded Monterrey Jack because apparently counting slices of mozzarella when you're at the grocery store is for winners.

Talk about not traditional.

More MEAT.

Then, top with grated parmesan.

Now...bake it at 350 degrees for about 30minutes, or until the top is bubbly and beautiful.

And then... AND THEN....

Feeding frenzy. The best part is I have 6 more slices of this in the freezer to eat. *DIES*

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Superbowl Chili

2010-02-07T23:19:00.005-06:00

Chili. It's a staple of this great American holiday - the Superbowl. Food, beer, football. The three essentials in life. Just kidding-ish. Let's be honest, all I care about is the food. Last year I got ambitious and made like a 12 lb pork shoulder for BBQ pulled pork. It was glorious, don't get me wrong, but it was kind of a lot of work. This year it was just me and my roommates taking it easy.... chili was a natural choice. This particular one has just a touch of heat, and is really filling and toasty. It's a big hit and really easy to bring together.

You'll need:
-1 small onion
-1 bell pepper (I used yellow but it doesn't really matter) - interesting fact, people in Australia call bell pepper capsicum. I was confused the entire time.
-1 lb ground beef
-2 cloves of garlic
-1 tablespoon of cumin
-1 tablespoon of chili powder
-1/2 tablespoon paprika (optional, but I love the flavor)
-1/4 teaspoon black pepper
-1 can tomato sauce (recipe calls for 1 regular sized can, but I used almost all of a big sized can. Tomatoes are awesome, what can I say.)
-1 can of Rotel (or just diced tomatoes if you have that on hand)
-1 can of kidney beans
-1 can of black beans
-1 can of northern white beans

Ok! First, you'll want to dice up the onion and pepper.

While you're dicing, get a big dutch oven pot and start heating it up on medium to medium high heat. Throw in the pepper, onion, beef, and 2 cloves of minced garlic.

You'll want to cook this mixture until all the meat browns, and the onions and peppers are tender.

Almost done with the meat browning at this point! This should take about 6-8 minutes.

Bring the heat down to medium and add in the cumin, paprika, chili powder and black pepper. Be slightly alarmed at the ginormous amount of seasoning that is. Mix it together and cook for another minute or so. Might want to start opening all of your cans while this is melding together, my hand got a cramp when I did it.

Now, add in the Rotel, tomato sauce, and all of the beans. Ah the beans! They're so glorious.

Give it all a big stir and bring the whole mixture to a boil. Once it's bubblin', bring the chili back down to a simmer and let it hang out with the occasional stir for about 45 minutes. Gives it a chance to thicken up and all the spices just start making beautiful music together. Whoo it's so good.

That's literally it! Serve it up in a big bowl with some cheese and sour cream, and oh man you're in for a treat!

I ate two bowls. Don't tell anyone.

Enjoy! (And Geaux Saints! What a great game!)

<3

Courtzilla

French Onion Soup

2010-01-26T22:07:00.008-06:00

Have you ever smelled heaven? How about love?

No? Well get ready to experience it, all you have to do is make a big pot of French Onion Soup. I got this recipe from my girl, Pioneer Woman. Holy cow. HOLY. COW. Make some. Your lives will be changed. Your nose will rejoice. Your roommate Drew will walk in and ask who made Hamburger Helper.

...er...

Ok, that really happened, but then he tried the soup. AND THEN HE FELL IN LOVE. He fell in love with the soup, not me. Don't get too excited.

Let's get 'er started.

You will need:
- 3/4 stick of butter
- 6 small onions, or 4 bigguns
- 1 cup of dry white wine
- 4 cups of chicken broth
- 4 cups of beef broth
- pack of onion soup mix (optional)
- 2 cloves of garlic
- 1 tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce (interesting fact, I still can not say that word)
- salt and pepper to taste

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Melt the butter over medium heat in a large oven-safe pot. You may recognize my glorious pot from it's roast beef days. Ahhh those were the days.

While the pan/butter/oven is heating up, slice your onions very thinly. Basically you'll want to cut the onions from root to tip, then cut off the tips from the onion halves. Place them flat side down, and slice thinly in the same direction you used to cut off the tip of the onion. Discard the root at the end. The onion's natural shape will break it apart further when it starts cooking.

Phew I'm out of breath. Just learn how to cut onions, okay? PLEASE?

Alrighty, now throw the onions in your pot with the butter, and cook them with the lid on for about 20 minutes.

Make sure you stir every so often so they don't get stuck to the bottom. They'll look soft, like this when they're done:

It means they're full of buttery love.

Now here's a trick ol' Pioneer Woman taught me. Put your pot in the oven, with the lid slightly cracked open. Leave it in there for about an hour, stiring once or twice to move around the onions. This makes them brown a lot nicer. Seriously, this is what it looks like after a half hour:

And now an hour.

UHHH YUM.

Don't worry about the black bits either, that just translates to flavor in the end product.

Ok, stir around the onions, scraping the brown and black bits off the side. Pour in your cup of wine and stir for 5 minutes. This is called deglazing the pan.

Once your flavor has been sucked up from the pan, add the beef broth, chicken broth, garlic, and Worcestershire sauce.

Let that simmer at a medium to medium low heat for about 40 minutes.

End product will look like this.

Wam, bam, thank you 'mam.

Load up a bowl with some of this fragrant, delicious, hearty stuff.

Drunk a parmesan roll into it.

And all is right with the world. Seriously, try this. SO GOOD.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Easy Parmesan Rolls

2010-01-26T21:14:00.005-06:00

First off, let me apologize for my absence. In the beginning I was saving money for Australia, then I was in Australia for three weeks, then I was in Canada for a week, then I was broke off of Australia and the holidays in Canada. In a nutshell, I'm still broke, but I'm starting to get sick of sandwiches so I've been cooking again! Quite a bit actually. I've got a few posts planned out, so no extended breaks are in my future. I know, you are SO lucky.

Have you ever wanted to show off in front of your friends? Make them think you've been slaving over a stove all day making artisan rolls? Well I would recommend these suckers. Knotted parmesan rolls. Great in soups or with a hearty salad! Check out how easy these are.

Let me go ahead now and apologize, I forgot to take pictures of the first couple steps. I could have SWORN I had... I will blame Roommate Rob. I don't know how he's to blame, but I'm sure it's his fault.

So, you will need:
- 1 can of 8 grands biscuits (not the flaky kind)
- about 2 tablespoons of melted margarine or butter
- about 4 tablespoons of grated parmesan cheese

Yup, that's it.

First, get all the biscuits out of the container and preheat the oven to 350 degrees. You'll want to roll the buscuits on a flat surface or cutting board, so they look like a long rope, about 6-8 inches long.

Then, just pretend you're working at Annie's Pretzels and tie them in a basic knot. They should look kinda like this.

Skillz my friends, skillz. Mad shoe tying skillz.

Plop the buns onto a pan, no need to spray it or anything.

Now, brush your melted butter over the buns. I don't have a brush, so I poured.

And by poured, I mean got crazy with the butter. What? It's winter, sue me.

Go ahead and sprinkle the butter loaded buns with your parmesan cheese.

Hello, lover.

You'll want to put these in the oven until they get browned on top, about 15 minutes or so. Keep your eye on them though, my oven likes to play with my head sometimes. You should have seen the angel food cake disaster of '10.

They should look something like this:

Hello, lover. Come closer. Come swim in my pool. What pool you ask? This pool.

AKA My next post. You really ARE so lucky.

Then, should you feel inclined, gang up on the only other girl roommate and electric tape her ankles together Dexter style.

Troublemakers.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Tomato Tortellini Soup

2009-10-28T18:14:00.000-05:00

Can we have a moment of honesty here? I swear, I started with a recipe. Then...thennnnn....I got adventurous. I added. I added. I ADDED. Let's try and recall what I did, shall we? This should be a fun game.

You might need:
1 can of diced tomatoes
1 can of tomato sauce
4 cups of chicken broth
1 cup of milk
Mayhap a splash of beef stock
1 stalk of celery
1 small onion
1 carrot
1/4 cup of flour
1 - 2 cups of cooked chicken
1 small package of cheese tortellini.
2 cloves of garlic
3-5 thyme stems
2 bay leaves
Plenty of salt and pepper

Maybe. That's what I remember anyway. Moral of the story: this is more of a technique then an actual recipe. Nonetheless, it was a DELICIOUS experiment.

First, you want to create a base for the soup. In french cooking, the combination of onion, celery, and carrots is called a mirepoix. Basically, it's magical. The sum is far greater than it's humble parts.

So, chop up your celery, carrot, and onion.

And saute in a bit of olive oil. Use a big pot. Especially if you're prone to adding. Don't look at me.

Then, my pictures jump from the saute above, to this:

So, let's piece together what I did.

First, add the flour and mix it with the vegetables until they're all coated. This will act as a thickening agent. Now, you can dump in your broth and milk. Allow that to cook for about 5 - 10 minutes until it reduces a little and thickens up. Then, add the diced tomatoes and tomato sauce for a good tomato flavor. Add your garlic, salt, pepper, thyme, and bay leaves. Taste it at this point. Do you want to tinker with it? It's all about what you like. Feel free to throw in vegetables, some spinach would be really good in this. Or some green beans! I'm pretty sure this is the point I threw in the towel though.

Bring the soup to a boil, and throw in the chicken and tortellini for 8 - 10 minutes, until it's warm.

Serve up a big bowl with your favorite crusty bread.

Feel free to burn the bread while you're tinkering with the broth too. It's what the cool kids are doing.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Huevos Rancheros

2009-10-27T21:33:00.006-05:00

I don't know about you, but one of my favorite styles of food is Mexican. Simple ingredients, inexpensive, simple preparation, BIG HUGE flavor. Does it get any better?

One thing that's always weirded me out a bit was huevos racheros. Ranch eggs? Basically an egg taco? Whatttt? Then, I tried making it. Holy cow. It's super tasty! It's a fast breakfast/lunch/dinner too, and nice and light. Basically....I just got done eating it and I think I want 4 more.

Here's what you'll need (for one serving):
- 2 eggs
- 2 corn tortillas
- 1/4 cup cheddar cheese
- tbsp of chopped cilantro
- 4 tbsp of your favorite salsa
- 1/2 lime
- salt, pepper
- dollop of sour cream
- re-fried beans (optional)

First, you'll want to get all your ingredients ready to go - the cooking process takes like 5 minutes. Heat up your pan. Chop up the cilantro, grate your cheese, cut a lime in half, get everything in a little assembly line.

Ok, spray some cooking spray on your skillet, and throw in your tortillas. This will crisp them up a bit, and warm them up too.

When those have heated, I just put a thin layer of re-fried beans on the tortilla and nuke it for 30 seconds at the end. Totally optional, I just like the creamy texture.

Looks like dog shit, tastes dddeeeelicious.

Ok, now spray the pan again, and crack a couple of eggs in the pan.

I broke a yolk. CRAP. Courtzilla, strikes again.

Once the bottom sets up, flip it over, and put some cheese and salsa on top of the eggs.

Throw a cover on top of the pan. This will melt the cheese without over cooking the eggs. At this point I take the pan off the heat and just let it sit for about a minute.

Ohhhhh yeahhhhhh.

Throw it on your tortilla, put a dollop of sour cream, a squirt of lime, and some cilantro on top and you are solid.

Andddd... dig in.

UGHHHHHHHHHHHH.

Excuse me, I need to make some more.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Criminal Pumpkin Muffins

2009-10-21T23:17:00.005-05:00

Why are these so criminal? How can a muffin be classified as dangerous?

It's not really the muffin that should be outlawed, it's the fact that I'm posting this recipe.

You see.... these pumpkin muffins....

have...

two ingredients.

THE SECRET IS OUT.

You'll need:

- 1 30oz can of pumpkin puree - NOT PUMPKIN PIE FILLING
- A box of spice cake mix.

Ha, you think I'm joking.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Combine.

Plop into muffin tins.

Bake for about 30 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean. Or until you can't wait any longer, pop one in your mouth, and it doesn't taste like dough.

HAHAHA.

Impress all you friends with your "home-made" muffins. Seriously, it'll be a hoot. And what perfect FALL timing?? You could even say these are low fat - no added oil, eggs, or butter. Some would call these muffins revolutionary.

Some also need to stop getting so excited about 2 ingredient muffins.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Best website ever?

2009-10-04T14:16:00.001-05:00

"...when eating Bagel Bites, I always have the same dilemma: do I try and bite the mini-bagel in half, getting sauce and cheese all over my lips when I invariably can’t bite cleanly through the bagel, or do I stuff the whole thing in my mouth like some kind of bagel-crazed giant? The answer is b, the bagel-crazed giant one."

Food in real life. Check it, and die laughing.

http://foodirl.com/

<3, the zilla.

Red Wine Pot Roast

2009-10-04T13:25:00.000-05:00

Do you know what heaven smells like? I do. POT ROAST.

Holy cow, it's getting cold quick. I need to build up my fat layer. I'm through with you, salads. Bring on the toasty beef stews.

This is an all time favorite of mine.... and this was my first attempt cooking it myself. GREAT SUCCESS! My guts loved me. On to the recipe.

You'll need:
- A chuck roast
- Carrots
- 1 onion
- thyme
- bay leaves
- a nice red wine (cabernet sauvignon? merlot? up to you.)
- beef stock
- 1 can cream of mushroom soup
- onion soup mix
- salt and pepper
- i think I added garlic
- splash of olive oil

Let's get this love fest started.

First, chop up your veggies while your big, oven-safe pot is heating up. Also, preheat your oven to 325 ish degrees. This thing is going to go in for a longgggggggggg time.

Nice big chunks, please. And....I used baby carrots so I wouldn't have to chop. UBER lazy.

Now, season your chuck with a nice healthy portion of salt and pepper. When you're buying one, look for good marbling. The fat makes it superrrr juicy and tender.

Both sides, folks.

Ok, you want your pot screamin' hot. We want to get some nice color on this beef. Plop it in your pot.

THIS is color, baby.

After it's gotten a lovely tan, take your hunka meat and let it rest for a bit. Now we want to get some color on the veggies.

BTDubs, check out the mess I'm making. NICE.

Plop in your veggies.

Till they look like this.

You don't want to cook them, just brown them a bit.

Ok, now lay your meat on top of your veggies. Make it a nice little bed.

Now... add in the cream of mushroom soup, about a cup of wine, just enough beef stock till it just covers the meat, the onion soup mix, and your garlic and herbs.

How pretty is that!! Now - stick it in the oven, and walk off. This was about a 4 pound chuck roast, so I left it for about 3 and a half hours.

What did I do for 3.5 hours...by myself...in my apartment?

What.

I couldn't let it go to WASTE.

Once the roast is done, you'll know. It literally fell apart on me when I was trying to get it out of the pot. PERFECTION.

Ughhhhhh... I need to make another one of these stat.

See! Fell apart. That's a very, very good sign.

You'll want to fish out your bay leaves and the thyme stems. That would be a gross bite.

I made some mashed potatoes to serve them with. You can throw the potatoes in with the roast, but IMHO they get all...mealy. And not tasty. I'm all about tasty.

Guys??? Holy cow. So good.

I clearly hated it.

AND I hated the wine too. I finished the whole bottle. I am a glutton.

Make this for your significant other, they will FALL IN LOVE.

Enjoy!

<3
Courtzilla

Greek Panzanella

2009-09-20T22:34:00.006-05:00

So... this name is a bit misleading. Greek panzanella. Panzanella is traditionally an Italian bread salad - usually made with croutons and various Italian veggies. I had a bag of Stacy's pita chips on hand that I stole from after hours at a wedding I was at... (thanks Josh!) and decided to go Greek! This is super delicious and refreshing. Great for a light dinner.

You'll need:
- chips or croutons
- tomatoes
- cucumbers
- red onions
- salt and pepper
- extra virgin olive oil
- balsamic vinegar
- parmesan cheese (feta would be luffly too.)

First, dump the chips in the bottom of a bowl. This recipe is easy to make for 1, or for 100, so I didn't provide measurements...seeing as I didn't actually take any while making it.

Then, chop up your veggies into bite-sized chunks. Add your cucumbers....

Tomatoes....

And red onions. Feel free to add the red onions just raw as they are... or use this trick. I personally don't like the taste of raw onions. It's way too strong for me. What you can do is give the onions an ice bath. I'm not even kidding.

Let them sit there while you're putting together the salad. It helps take the bite out of the onion. Sounds weird, but it works!

Go ahead and add the cheese at this point too.

I use fresh grated parmesan...but that's because I'm a snob.

While your onions are bathing, we can get the "dressing" ready. I use dressing in quotation marks because I hesitate to call it anything, since it's so easy.

So here's what you do. Pour extra virgin olive oil in a bowl. Add balsamic vinegar. It's about a 3:1 ratio.

Isn't that a sweet picture?

After you're done admiring (take your time), stir.

Now, add your onions, salt and pepper, and stir in dressing.

Cover and let sit in the fridge for a half hour. When you bring it out, it'll look like this!

All the dressing and tomato juices soak into the chips. It's so good. The chips are hearty enough that they don't get all soggy. Make sure you eat it that day though... once it's sat over night it definitely gets that gross mushy quality. I was very upset at lunch the next day.

That's it! Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Dimply Strawberry Cake

2009-09-09T00:48:00.007-05:00

This is kinda less of a cake, and more of a fat kid breakfast. It's not super sweet...and yet you find yourself craving milk. I loved it! Clearly, I belong in fat kid camp. Who wants to watch Heavyweights with me??

But seriously. This was originally going to be the cake to show off my uber cute baby plums... but they went bad before I could use them. And I cried. For DAYS. And then I ate cake and got over it.

You'll need:

-1 1/2 cups of flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1/4 tsp of salt
- 1/4 tsp of cinnamon
- 5 tablespoons of butter
- 3/4 cup packed brown sugar
- 2 tsp of vanilla extract
- 2 large eggs
- zest from one orange (which I didn't have, and I didn't think lime zest would be the best alternative....)
- 1/3 cup canola or vegetable oil
- cute baby plums.... orrrr whatever fruit you've got.

First thing's first... preheat your oven to 350 degrees!

Then, butter and flour your pan. Seriously, it's exactly how it sounds. You rub butter around the inside of the pan, then sprinkle flour over it. It helps the cake to come out of the pan clean!

Ok, in a medium sized bowl, whisk together your flour, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt.

Perfect, you're doing so swell.

Alrighty then. Take your softened butter, and put it in another larger bowl. You'll want to mix the butter until it gets light and creamy. Once it's at that stage, add the brown sugar. After a couple minutes it'll look like so...

SUPER appetizing, right?

Ok, now you'll want to add your eggs, one at a time. Afterwards beat each egg on high for about 1 minute. This will thicken up your batter.

At this point, add in your vanilla, zest, and oil and beat until incorporated. I bet this would've been great with the zest. Sighhhh.

Ok, now slowly add in your flour, until it looks like this:

Beautiful! Now pour it in your pan, and level it out so it'll bake evenly.

The swirlage is not necessary in the least.

Now you'll want to add the fruit. As I said, all I had were strawberries... so I wanted to make the most of it. I made this.

Not bad right?

Ok, now you just throw it in the oven, and let it sit for about 40 minutes.

Or at least it should be that simple.

If you used less juicy plums.

If you used strawberries or another juicy fruit (remind me to tell you about my blackberry scone failure), let me show you a trick.

So, I peeked in the over at about the 20 minute mark.

Action shot blur, that's when you know this is getting intense.

Basically what was happening, was 1) my strawberry flower was doomed, and 2) the outsides were cooking way quicker than the middle where all the juicy strawberries were keeping things moist. Moist. What a gross word.

Here's what you do. Make it a foil jacket. It'll totally thank you later.

Just look at it! All dressed up for it's first day of school.

But seriously, the foil will help protect the outsides, while allowing the middle to cook all the way through. How I bombed chemistry, I'll never know.

Twenty minutes later, BAHAHAH!! Perfection.... other than my fail-tastic strawberry flower thingy.

Look how cute and dimply it is.

You'll want to let it cool for about 10 minutes, by the way.

To take it up a notch, I sprinkled a bit of powdered sugar on top.

Beeeeeautiful. Ain't she pretty?

Then cut it up into squares, and serve!

AND DEMOLISH.

Nom nom nom.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Dill Chicken Salad

2009-09-09T00:24:00.008-05:00

Ok, when you think of the words "chicken salad" what do you think of? I think of crappy restaurant choices and disappointments. Depressing, I realize. THAT NEEDED TO CHANGE. Whenever I order chicken salad, I'm always thinking eh...it's ok. Unless I'm at Penn Station, but I'm fairly certain they put some sort of crack in their recipe.

Chicken salad is one of those classic lunch recipes that can be so individualized, that everyone has a "chicken salad, my way" recipe. Well, you do if you're me. And here's mine.

You'll need:
- A cut up whole chicken. I believe they're called "fryer chicken".
- 1/3 cup low fat mayo
- 1/3 cup light sour cream
- handful of fresh dill
- pinch 'o paprika
- juice from 1 lemon
- 1 tablespoon brown sugar
- salt and pepper
- 2-3 stalks of chopped up celery
- couple handfuls of halved grapes
- green onions if you've got any (oh wait, I didn't)

Ok! First - the chicken. The main component. The heart of the meal.

Rinse off the raw chicken, and place it in a pot of water. A BIG pot.

Put the pot on the stove, and bring to a boil. Once it hits the boil point for around 5 minutes, bring the heat down to a simmer. You'll want to let it sit and cook for about 40 minutes.

While the chicken is bubbling away in it's hot bath, I start the sauce! Basically, you'll want to combine your sour cream, mayo, salt, pepper, paprika, lemon juice, brown sugar, and whatever else floats your boat into a small bowl. Pretty sure I added some other stuff, but I'm so behind on posting I can't be bothered to remember.

Just mix that all together! You can also chop up your dill and add it to the sauce at this point.

Have you ever had fresh dill? It adds a distinctly pickle-y flavor, and I don't have to add weird pickle texture. It's the best compromise ever.

Okie dokie. When your chicken is done, take it outta the pot.

At this point you can do one of two things. I like my chicken salad chunky, so i rip the meat off the bone and chop it into cute chunks. Some people like their chicken salad all one texture - if that's your preference, go ahead and shred up all the chicken with two forks at this point.

Then, add the chicken to a bowl with your chopped up veggies, like so!

COLORS.

Guess what the last step is.

Dump in your sauce, and MIX!!

Yummo! Put it on a bun, or on some lettuce with some cute cherry tomatoes! Go crazy and TOAST the bun. I know, I know, I push you too far.

Hello, lover. Slash lunch for the next 4 days.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Blueberry Crisp

2009-08-26T23:25:00.007-05:00

So I made that apple crisp before, and it was pretty good. The maple was a nice touch, but the topping was a little lacking for me. I found a new method that really pumps up the crunch factor. Definitely use this recipe and tweak it how you like.

Easy and delicious, it is extremely difficult to mess this up. Blueberries are so great right now at the farmer's markets, but if you find raspberries, peaches, apples, blackberries, you get the idea, they all work wonderfully with this dish. It's a great summer dessert with some vanilla ice cream!

You'll need...

1 cup Blueberries (or Any Fresh Fruit), Washed
1 tablespoon Lemon Juice
⅔ cups Brown Sugar, Packed
½ cups All-purpose Flour
½ cups Quick Cooking Oats
⅓ cups Butter Or Margarine, Softened
¾ teaspoons Ground Cinnamon
¼ teaspoons Salt

This makes about 4 generous servings.

Ok, first, cut a lemon in half. OK you're done! Told you it was easy.

Just kidding, you caught me. Oh man, I'm such a joker.

In all seriousness-ish, lay the blueberries in a baking dish, and toss them in some freshly squeezed lemon juice, about 1/2 a lemon. This just gives them a nice zing when everything is said and done. Wakes 'em up. Gives 'em some pep.

Ok...now mix everything else in a big bowl! I find it's easier to melt the butter a little in the microwave.

You'll want to mix everything together, until it's kinda in little lumps. Lumps = more buttery crunch. Definite plus when it comes to something with "crisp" in the name.

While I was fantasizing about buttery crunch, my roommate was making his lunch for the next day. This is what he was making.

Lettuce. He eats a salad and a chicken boob just about every day for lunch. A whole head of romaine. Quick poll, which do you prefer. Lettuce? Or buttery blueberry crisp?
...
....
Yeah, I said lettuce too.

At this point, while you want to scatter the topping all over the blueberries, and stick it in an oven that has been preheated to 375 degrees.

Ok, give it a half hour. Do your nails. Watch Family Guy. Read TFLN like me.

Come back to THIS.

Want to know what I had for dinner that night?

God I disgust myself.

My roommates are also disgusted with me.

Awww they're really cute underneath the hostile exterior. BTdubs, that bucket in the foreground is full of fresh corn. Gotta love Illinois.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Coming soon...

2009-08-26T15:15:00.003-05:00

So I'm super behind on my blogging. Cooking-wise, I have like five...yes FIVE new recipes to share. SO... to blog dump or not to blog dump.

Which do you prefer...

- 5 recipes spread out over the week?
- 5 recipes all at once for your salivating pleasure.

Let me know in the comments!

<3 Courtzilla

Fluffity Stuffity Potatoes

2009-08-18T19:12:00.008-05:00

Ever had twice baked potatoes?

No?

Then I would argue you haven't lived. These things are potatoes made from little fluffy pieces of heaven. They are argueably not healthy for you...they are also arguably some of the best potatoes ever. Read on if your waistline can handle it. If not, wait about half an hour and I'll post my summer vegetable salad recipe!

You'll need:
- 5 - 10 yellow potatoes. Not the huge ones, the mid-sized ones. Make however many you need/want for lunch the next day.
- a smidge of cream cheese
- couple spoonfuls of sour cream
- a sprinkle of cheese (I think I used Monterrey Jack cheese, but you can use cheddar or whatever you've got)
- couple tablespoons of chopped chives
- garlic
- bacon bits? peas and carrots? onions? peppers? Let's be honest... this is a good way to use up your veggies.
- olive oil
- salt and pepper

Ok! First, you want to preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Then, rinse and scrub your potatoes. Throw them on a baking sheet, and drizzle some olive oil on them. You can also add some salt and pepper right now.

Let them bake along all honky dory in the oven for about 45 minutes.

Toasty.

Now, once they've cooled a bit you want to scoop out their souls, so they become shells of their former selves. Like this!

Now, you definitely don't want the souls to go to waste... so mash them up with the cream cheese, cheese, sour cream, garlic, and chives! Plus... any of the extras like bacon bits etc.

Doesn't THAT look appetizing.

Now, take scoops of the stuff, and load them into the potato boats you made earlier.

Now, you just want to stick them back in the oven for about 15 ish minutes!

VOILA!!

Delicious.

My roommate Rob is as happy as a clam. What a lucky guy.

Next up! The corn salad you see pictured.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Foodie Blog Roll

2009-08-18T17:05:00.006-05:00

So, as you may have noticed I'm part of a foodie bloglist. You can see the application on the left side of the screen. Akin to googling yourself, I searched Courtzilla on the browse blogs portion of their website.

What tags did they designate for my humble blog?

Tags: recipes, college, easy, humor, dinosaurs, 30 minute meals, 5 ingredients or less

Recipes, college, easy, humor, 30 minute meals, 5 ingredients... all legit.

But DINOSAURS?

I literally snorted into my diet coke. I feel like I should cook up a massive steak and call it like a brontosaurus slab or something. How much do you want to bet that I'm the only one on the Foodie Blog Roll with a "dinosaur" tab.

Keep your eyes peeled for a new post or two this evening.

Dinos for life,

<3 Courtzilla

Asian-Style Flank Steak

2009-08-13T00:16:00.006-05:00

You want meat? I'll give you meat.

For those scared of strong flavors...run now, and run quickly. This marinade is not for the weak and wimpy.

However, it is for those who enjoy asian flavors and cheap cuts of beef. Raise your hand if that's you. (My hand is TOTALLY raised).

Now... I only have pictures of me making the marinade. I took it over to grill at the boys house, because they are lucky, lucky men. BUT! It's pretty simple...and I'm going to yoink a money shot from The Pioneer Woman, because that's where I got the recipe.

You'll need:

1/2 cup soy sauce
1/2 cup cooking sherry
3 tablespoons honey
2 tablespoons sesame oil - really important and an asian food must
2 heaping tablespoons minced ginger, aka star of the marinade
3 to 5 cloves minced garlic
1/2 teaspoons red pepper flakes if you can handle it

1 flank steak

Alrighty! Let's get crackalackin'.

Take your steak. For those of you who don't know, this is what a flank steak looks like. It's massive, just FYI.

Ok! Now, throw your flank steak into a ziplock bag. These directions are super complicated.

You'll want to chop up your ginger. What's ginger look like raw? Something like this. Kinda like an alien. To chop it up, you'll want to take of the outer part...as that pretty much tastes like wood. You'll be left with a fragrant piece of...stringy...root thing. Looks like this.

Now! Chop that piece into matchsticks, then chop the matchsticks into tini tiny pieces and throw it in the bag with your steak. Oh, go ahead and throw everything else in there too.

Go ahead, close it and give it a couple 'o squishes.

Ok, for flank steak you'll want to marinate it for at least 3 hours. The marinade kinda works into the steak, making it more tender. It's especially important for flank steak, since it's kind of a tough steak to begin with. Tough = manly. Manly = delicious. In some world that makes perfect sense.

OK! Here's where my pictures end...and PW's begin. Color me jealous.

At this point, you're ready for grilling. You'll want to get the grill/grill pan smokin' hot. You just want to sear the outsides, since it's a pretty thin steak. Overcooking this is criminal. For medium rare, it's about 4 minutes on each side. I went more for 6 or so minutes on each side, since rare meat makes me nervous.

PW, can I be you? She even does the hatch marks. Le sigh.

Once it's done, take it off the grill and let it set under some foil for about 10 minutes. This will let the juices redistribute. If you don't let it sit...all the juicy goodness will just die on your counter. Don't let the juice die!

When you do cut it, make sure to cut it against the grain of the meat. This will help with the tough meat! Do as PDub does.

Holy delciousness batman. It's such a great dish! Perfect to serve with a mandarin orange salad, or some delicious twice baked new potatoes*.

*Coming soon to a blog near you.

Enjoy!

<3>

Strawberry Buttermilk Cupcakes

2009-08-09T10:39:00.004-05:00

aka. THE BEST CUPCAKES EVER.

Matt made me go to the bookstore, and I ended up picking up three new books that I absolutely do not need, one of them being Martha Stewart's cupcake book. Clearly, I needed to bake immediately.

These may be my favorite cupcakes of all time. I think the boys agreed, they got demolished in record time. I swapped out her frosting for a concoction of my own, and swapped buttermilk for regular milk. Fresh strawberries, vanilla, buttermilk? YES PLEASE.

Here's how you make them! (Makes ... a ton. Like 36 - 40)

You'll need:
2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup cake flour (not self rising)
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
2 1/4 cups sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
3 large whole eggs, plus 1 egg white
1 cup buttermilk
2 cups finely chopped strawberries, plus more for garnish

Frosting:
- 1 box of powdered sugar
- 4 oz cream cheese
- 4 spoonfuls of strawberry jam
- pinch of salt
- 1/4 cup of milk

While not exactly simple per se, these have become my new favorite cupcake. SO moist, SO delicious. Watch me work.

First, sift together the flours, baking powder, and salt. Set aside. Might want to preheat your oven to about 350 degrees at this point.

Cream together the sugar, vanilla, and softened butter, until pale and fluffy. Then, add the eggs, one at a time, into the mixture. Make sure each egg is beaten into the butter/sugar before added the next egg. Did that sentence make sense? No idea.

Next, mix in the flour in two batches, alternating with the buttermilk.

Now, you'll want to chop up about 1/2 of your strawberries. We'll use the rest for garnish. Fold the chopped berries into your batter. When it bakes up, it'll look like this...dispersing fresh berries all through your cupcake!

Fill each cupcake tin about 3/4 of the way up, and bake for 20-25 minutes. Cool on a rack completely, about 30 minutes.

For the icing, pretty much dump everything in a bowl and stir.

If you want it thinner, you can add more milk. I really like the flavor of this icing. Originally I was just going to make the one on the back of the powdered sugar box, but it was WAYYYY too sweet. So, to counter it, I added a bit of salt, then some strawberry jam and the cream cheese. WAY good. Too good? I ate the leftovers with a spoon. Don't tell anyone.

Pile the frosting on top, and garnish with your strawberries!

Yeah. That happened. Thank you Martha, you've made my world a much better place.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

The reason I am not Julia Child.

2009-08-02T08:59:00.004-05:00

Julia making a French style omelette. (No, seriously watch it. It's magical, and it'll make you want to go see Julie and Julia which comes out...next weekend I believe?)

Courtzilla making a French omelette.

EPIC. FAIL.

At least it still tasted ok?

<3 Courtzilla

Drunk Potato Wedges

2009-07-23T22:15:00.006-05:00

So, last night I had a random Courtzilla Cooks moment at a friends place at around 2am. What we had - potatoes. What we wanted - drunk food. Solution?

Drunk Potato Wedges.

Recipe... ehhh.... photos of me making it... ehhh... these important things become irrelevant at that hour. But here's a basic break down of what I did.

- Washed potatoes.
- Preheat oven to 425
- Cut potatoes into wedges.
- Drizzle wedges with olive oil.
- Sprinkle on seasonings... in this case, salt, pepper, garlic powder, and a bit of cayenne.
- Put in oven for 45 minutes to an hour, until browned.

Make sure you toss it up once about 20 minutes into baking so they don't stick to your pan.

Then, you end up with this!

My friend Ian, enjoying his drunk wedges. Note - the disaster of a kitchen and the naked lady cup he's holding. NSFW kids.

You also end up with a fantastic invention.... we called it, "Ranch-up". Or maybe it was "Ketchanch". I can't say I clearly recall.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Restaurant Style French Toast

2009-07-21T18:54:00.009-05:00

AKA Holy shit, she's posting.

Here it is folks, a quick post about one of my favorite Sunday morning breakfasts. Or Tuesday night dinners. Or... okay, I admit I'll eat this anytime. It's French toast! You can't really go wrong.

First things first, you'll want to mix together (for eight pieces), 4 eggs, 1 tbp sugar, 1 tsp salt, 1/4 cup of flour, 1/2 tsp cinnamon, 1/2 tsp vanilla, and 1 cup of milk.

Whisk together until it looks slightly gross, like this!

Then, dip your bread in, letting it soak for about 30 seconds.

Once that's soaking, spread some butter in a skillet until it melts, and plop your bread in. It only takes about 2 minutes on each side to brown up nicely.

Once that's done... all that's left to do is smother it in maple syrup. If you're Canadian, use ketchup. For the purpose of this post, I used syrup. Didn't want to scare away more people than necessary.

That's it!! Enjoy anytime. It's too good just to waste on breakfast.

<3 Courtzilla

Delay...again

2009-07-14T22:36:00.002-05:00

Sorry again for the delay... it was my birthday! Very busy...

Got some fun things coming up!

-Fruit with balsamic vinegar - sounds weird, tastes delicious
-Sweet Italian sausage and pepper sandwich
-That French toast I never actually posted
-A very special potential guest blog. Yes, you can be a guest on Courtzilla!!

Stay tuned!

<3 Courtzilla

Greek Style Chicken

2009-07-07T19:47:00.006-05:00

Mediterranean foods are some of my absolute favorite flavors. The ingredients are so simple, but pack a great punch. It helps that the majority of them are fairly healthy for you too... so when I eat 2 pieces of chicken I don't feel THAT bad about it.

I was making this for the boys across the street, so I've got some limited pictures... but this recipe is so simple I don't see how that would hamper you at all.

You'll need:

- 4 chicken breasts
- 1/2 cup of olive oil
- juice from 1 lemon
- 2 tsp of minced garlic
- about a 1/2 tbsp of oregano (dried)
- 1 tbsp of red wine vinegar
- plenty of salt and pepper

Ok! Basically.... put ALL the ingredients in a zip lock bag, and mush it around so everything is coated in the marinade. Put it in the fridge for at least a half hour, so the chicken soaks up all the goodness. If you get some lemon seeds in there, it's not a big deal. You can pick them off when you're grilling the chicken.

You can also use this base marinade for some cut up potatoes. Makes for a great flavor when you roast them!

Please forgive my craptastic photography.

After you've let it marinade a bit... throw it on the grill! .... orrrrr grill pan! .... or saute pan!

Ok, so basically you just want to cook the chicken until it's no longer pink, and the juices run clear. I cooked it over a medium flame and it took about 7 - 8 minutes on each side, but this will vary depending on the plumpness of your chicken boob. If you want, before you put it in the marinade you can pound them flat to help even out the cooking time.

And... that's seriously it.

I served it with the green bean salad and some pesto cous cous, which is basically store bought cous cous and some stirred in basil pesto. It gave it a punch of flavor.

The chicken will have this really subtle lemon flavor, and the marinade keeps it juicy and delicious! It's a great easy summer meal for sure.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Cold Green Bean Salad

2009-07-07T09:50:00.004-05:00

Ahhh, the glories of summer. All I want to do is eat cold salads with lots of in season veggies. What's in season now you ask? Green beans! They're are on sale and super cheap...and I'm obsessed with them. It's the perfect combination.

This salad is a refreshing green bean and tomato salad, with a light vinegrette. It's great for a side dish next to something straight off the grill. To make it, you'll need...

- Couple hand fulls of green beans
- A pint or so of grape or cherry tomatoes
- A sprinkle of feta cheese
- About 1 tsp of garlic
- 1/3 cup of olive oil
- 2 tbsp of red wine vinegar
- 1 tsp oregano
- salt and pepper

To start, you'll want to boil some salted water. Once the water is at a rolling boil, throw your green beans (make sure you trim off the tough ends) in the water for about 5 - 7 minutes, until they're tender but still have a bite to them. Drain and cool the green beans.

You'll also want to halve some tomatoes, and throw them in a clean bowl. Or... a cake pan. I haven't done dishes in a while, step off.

At this point you can throw the cooled green beans in the bowl, and sprinkle some feta over it.

Mmmk... the dressing!

Add your olive oil, red wine vinegar, salt, pepper, garlic, and oregano in a small bowl.

At this point you can throw some chopped shallots in there too if you fancy.... but raw onions make me smell bad so I leave them out.

Whisk it together until everybody gets to know one another reallll well.

Now drizzle the dressing over your veggies.

Now just toss it all together... and savor the deliciousness that is summer.

Yum! The dressing is really what makes this POP!

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Tales from the crypt.

2009-07-07T09:25:00.002-05:00

Just wanted to check in and say... I'm not dead. Holidays are over, and I've got 3 posts to put up... they include...

- tomato and green bean salad
- greek chicken
- cinnamon french toast

I just need to find some spare time to freaking put them up! Keep watching this space folks.

Love you all.

<3 Courtzilla

Mac Attack

2009-06-26T22:16:00.005-05:00

Yes, I'm still sick. And you know what that means? More pasta.

But Courtzilla... didn't you JUST finish the leftover tortellini?

Shut up.

When a craving for Mac and Cheese happens, it just happens. It also happens that I had some sweet pasta shapes to use. Ok, I took any excuse I could to make this comforting mac and cheese!

You'll need (for 2 - 3 servings):

- 2 tbsp butter
- 2 tbsp flour
- 1 1/2 cups of milk
- 1 1/4 cups of cheddar cheese
- 1 cup of parmesan ... but it would be WAY better with something creamy, like marscapone or gruyere. Just sayin'.
- salt
- pepper
- various spices. Really..you can use what you've got. I used a splash of paprika, garlic powder, and red pepper. It would be great with nutmeg and cayenne though too! Orrr...whatever.
- 1/2 lb of pasta ... wait til you see the suckers I used

To start, preheat your oven to 375 degrees. Boil a pot of salted water for the pasta, and whip out your skillet.

Melt your butter in the skillet!

Once the butter starts to bubble and get a little brown, sprinle in your flour, and whisk. We're making a roux again, which will help thicken the cheese sauce.

Then, slowly add in your milk, whisking the whole while. This will get rid of any lumps in the roux. Once the milk is in, let it cook on medium heat for about ten minutes.

At this point in the game you'll want to add in a dash or two of all your favorite spice. I didn't really measure, I just dashed. Make sure you get your salt and pepper in there too!

Ok, now you'll want to turn down the heat to low, and add in a handful at a time of the cheddar cheese. Let the handful melt, then add in another..etc. Leave a bit left to sprink over the top before we bake it.

Pretty. Now add whatever other cheese you want! I only had parmesan, so that's what went in there. I'm telling you though, a creamy cheese would be DIVINE. So yeah... same method as the cheddar, and leave a bit to sprinkle on the top at the end.

Once all your cheese is melty, take it off the heat. Drain your pasta, and toss it in the cheese mixture! If it looks too thick, you can add a bit of the pasta water to the sauce to thin it out a little.

Tell me you're not drooling, I dare you.

Ok! Take a baking pan and butter it down, then pour the pasta mix into the pan. I used a loaf pan, because I didn't want to make too much of it. After the pasta is in, sprinkle the leftover cheese over the top, then pop it in the oven for 25 minutes, or until brown.

Once it looks like this...

You're good to go. Let it cool for 5 - 10 minutes, then take a slice and die a happy death.

I love this pasta! Look at the cute spirals. I'll also tell you this secret: it holds cheese sauce EXTREMELY well. Delicious.

If you're REALLY feeling fancy, you can add a super gourmet dipping sauce for it.

HAHAHA. Ketchup. What?? I'm Canadian...it's how we roll.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Nom Nom Tomato Basil Soup

2009-06-24T21:56:00.007-05:00

This is the easiest tomato soup you've ever made. I know you all make a lot of tomato soup, so I feel totally confident saying that.

I was really craving tomato soup and grilled cheese the other day... and damn that canned stuff just doesn't cut it any more. All I could taste was tin and water. Noooo thanks.

Seriously. 15 minutes. Takes just as long as mixing up the canned stuff and putting it in the micro. Watch me work.

Makes about 2 - 3 servings.

You'll need:
- 3 tablespoons of butter
- 1 1/2 tsp of garlic (minced)
- about 2 - 3 tbsp of flour
- about 2 cups of milk (or, Tina you can use vegetable broth!)
- 1 14 ish oz can of diced maters
- about 10 leaves of basil
- dried oregano
- 1 tbsp sugar
- salt
- pepper

optional: tomato paste

Yeah. 15 minutes. Trust me. I won't steer you wrong.

Ready to get started?

Take your butter and melt it in a pot. Put the heat on medium to medium low.

Toss in your garlic!

Ok, at this point we're going to make what's called a roux. It's basically the base for a lot of sauces and gravies. You just take fat, either butter or meat grease (bacon gravy? hello.), and mix it with some flour. It acts as a thickening agent, and makes things super delish.

So, throw your flour in, and mix it around.

Here's a fun story. The recipe I was kind of using as a guide said to use a cup... A CUP of flour. EFF THAT. Smart sense says just to use a bit.. but noooo... so I ended up with this.

I added in some milk to thin it out and got it down so there weren't any lumps left. No big deal. Use a whisk if that happens to you, it's the easiest way.

OK! After you've dealt with disaster and lived to tell about it, add in your milk and tomatoes. I smooshed them down a bit so they weren't in huge chunks. If you're feeling really motivated you can pulse it smooth in the food processor, or in the blender... but this is me here. I'm lazy. And now I can say it's "rustic". Plus, chunks don't bother me.

Smoosh smoosh.

At this point, add in your salt and pepper, to taste. I like a lot of ground pepper in this. I also threw in some basil, and some dried oregano for a little flavor boost. I add about a tbsp of sugar, just to combat the acidity of the maters, but taste it first, see if you need it.

Now at this point I tasted it and noticed two things. One, too milky. I wanted some ROBUST flavor, baby. So, I added about a half a can of this:

This packs some tomato PUNCH man. It's scrumptious. Optional, but scrumptious. Also, I noticed that the freaking huge amount of flour was doing it's trick, and it was a little too thick for me. One of my biggest pet peeves is when tomato soup tastes like pasta sauce. GROSS. So, I added about a cup of low sodium chicken broth. You can use veggie broth, or just water if you've got nothing on hand. It won't hurt the flavor none.

Now THAT'S what I'm looking for.

Put it in your favorite bowl with a couple of leaves of basil! (I LOVE my new basil plant!)

Looks positively gourmet.

Wait.

Wassat in the background.... hiding there...

AH HA!! Sneaky grilled cheese sandwich. See that wasn't fancy at all, so I couldn't show you I was making it. Kraft singles baby, ain't nothin' wrong with that.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Maple Apple Crisp

2009-06-23T22:29:00.008-05:00

Nothing says summer more than fresh fruit, baked with a crispy top and served with ice cream. Sounds nice doesn't it?

What's in season. Peaches! Peaches are in season. I've got a few let's use those.

Wait... what's that in the back of the crisper there... how long have I had these apples? Apple crisp it is.

Still, totally divine. Oh wait... no ice cream... maple cream sauce? Yeah that'll do in a pinch.

For as thrown together as this was, I devoured it in record time. And it's totally healthy! I mean... it's got fruit in it?

You'll need (for 2 servings)
- 1 apple
- 1/4 cup of flour
- 1/4 cup of quick oats
- 2 tbsp of sugar
- 2 tbsp of brown sugar (I know I know, these are pitifully small bits, but I'm just feeding me here, ok?)
- 2 tbsp of butter
- squirt oh lemon juice
- pinch of salt
- drizzle of maple syrup... or the fake stuff. I'll look the other way.

Ugh. I want to eat this every day for the rest of my life.

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

To begin, take two apples. Old apples. Of different races. It's cool, they'll get along.

Peel two apples, until they look naked and alone.

Slice up one of your apples and put it in a small oven safe dish.

Realize one apple takes up a lot of room. Proceed to eat the reject apple.

Drizzle the apples with lemon juice to prevent them from browning.

EXTREME ANGLE SHOT!!

Then, drizzle with some maple syrup, and stir around until everything commingles. Fun word.

Now! For the crisp.

Mix together your flour, oats, sugar, brown sugar, and a pinch of salt in a small bowl.

Now, cut up your butter into tiny cubes. You want the butter to be cold, that way it'll still be in little chunks when it goes into the oven, and will distribute pockets of love all over the top of the dish.

Mix your butter into your flour mix with a fork or a pastry cutter, until it resembles coarse sand... or something like this. Chunky is good, as long as everything is mixed together.

Evenly sprinkle over the top of your apples.

Now cover it with foil, and pop it into the oven for 10 -15 minutes.

While your waiting.. if you're feeling really naughty... and you've been surviving on tortellini for a day and a half...

Take a splash of cream, and put it in a sauce pan over the stove. Heat it up on low, and add a bit of maple syrup to it, like so...

Wait like 5 minutes until that cooks down a bit, then put it in the fridge so it thickens. Trust me. It's better than ice cream.

Once your 10 - 15 minutes is up, take out the crisp and uncover it. Put it back in the oven for another 2o minutes.

Then, when it looks like this:

Take a ginormous spoonful, and put it in a bowl.

You won't believe the apples with the maple syrup. It's insanely good. And then when you add some of that cream sauce?

Let's just say this didn't last too long. Good thing this was my dinner... ok ok I ate some tortellini too, so kill me.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Cozy Cheese Tortellini... baked!

2009-06-22T20:47:00.009-05:00

I've been majorly sick lately. Swine flu? Likely. (Kidding mom, it's just a really bad cold). When I'm sick I always crave pasta. Since John wanted to know how to make a baked pasta dish with some meat in it...(btw, what's with all the guys and meat? Holy carnivores batman)... this seemed like the perfect opportunity!

Bonus: I made this dish for around 4 servings. Aka I get to eat this 4 times this week. What's the awesome part you ask? I only used... ONE sausage and ONE small pack of tortellini. Pinching pennies? Try this out.

Here's the cast of characters.... missing a couple that I threw in randomly later.

- 1 small package of cheese tortellini (or really, any pasta you have on hand will do!)
- 1 sweet italian sausage
- about 1 cup of marinara sauce
- 1/2 cup ricotta cheese (would be splendid with marscapone too)
- 1/2 cup mozzarella cheese
- 1/4 cup shaved/grated/whatever parmigiana cheese. You can even use the cardboard Kraft stuff in the green container, see if I care.

Stuff I added because I can:
- 1/2 onion
- 1/4 green pepper
- 10 basil leaves
- 1 tsp dried oregano
- salt and pepper
- small splash of cream

If you add these extras... your life will be the better for it, trust me.

Ok! Let's get crackin'

First things first, preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Put a pot of water on the stove on high to boil. Add some salt.

Heat up a large skillet on medium low with a splash of oil in it.

Alrighty! Take your sausage and cut a slit down the center of it, like so.

Looks so gross. Tastes so delicious.

Remove the clear casing from around the sausage, and plunk the sausage into your skillet to brown. Break it up a bit. I leave them in decent sized chunks 'cause I like to pick them out and eat them first. :)

Then, finely dice an onion. No idea how to do it? Let me show you!

First, cut off a piece of the onion, going from tip to root. Cut that piece from top to bottom, in several vertical strips. Leave a bit at the top so it doesnt fall apart on you... like so!

Then, tip your knife and halve it, leaving a bit at the top again... like this...

Then turn your knife up again, and chop down, perpindicular to the vertical cuts you made in the first chop. Check it out, you're dicing, man!

Throw it into the pan and give it a stir.

Next, I chopped up a bit of pepper into match sticks, and then turned my knife just like I did with the onion, and I showed that pepper who's boss.

In my power trip moment, I forgot to take a picture of the final dice.... but I did throw the peppers into the pan!

Onions, peppers, and sausage. It was a natural choice to add the veggies.

Then, I added 1 cup of marinara sauce to the skillet!

At this point, the water in my pot was starting to get bubbly, so I tossed in the tortellini. You'll want to under cook your pasta a bit since we'll be baking it later, that way it doesn't turn all mushy and it'll absorb some of the sauce. That's called love, kids. Moral of the story: Instead of the full 7 - 10 minutes, I only let it boil for around 5.

Back to the sauce. This dish is all about the sauce. And the tortellini. And the cheese. But mostly the sauce.

Speaking of cheese, dump in your spoonful of ricotta to the hot sauce.

Mix it in and let it melt down a tad.

Oh hello there, beautiful. At this point I added some oregano, salt and pepper, and a slash of cream because I was feeling rebellious.

Ok! Now dump your drained tortellini into the scrumptious sinful sauce, and give it a good mix.

More dumping. Dump into an 8 x 8 pan, and spread it around so it's even.

Now, my favorite part. Sprinkle 1/2 cup of mozzarella over the top...

Then some parmesean... I had a big hunk of it so I just took my vegetable peeler and put a layer on the top.

Now... toss it into the oven for 15 - 20 minutes, until it gets all bubbly and browned on top. It's kind of fail proof.

While it's baking you can...

-Whip up a caesar salad!

- Chiffonade some basil for the top!

-Realize you really need a manicure! Look at that poor thumb nail.

- Keep up the chiffonade anyway!

- Admire your cute new basil plant!

- Try not to kill your new basil plant!

Look how productive I was. While all that was happening... this was happening in the oven.

SERIOUS DELCIOUSNESS ALERT.

This is one of my new favorites, I'll just throw it out there. It hit the spot times four billion.

Enjoy it with your favorite wine. Or if you're me...

Your favorite glass of milk. Ha! I figured the drinking gods would forgive me for one night off. I really had a rough day. This may have cured me though. Sigh. I can't wait for lunch tomorrow so I can eat it again.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

Monkey Bread, aka 8AM Heaven

2009-06-19T08:20:00.007-05:00

So I woke up this morning at 6:30 am. I don't start work until 10am. What's a girl to do?

Breakfast.

Plus I felt bad for not updating in a week. Sorry kiddos, I've had visitors. When I have visitors, I don't really eat. My diet turns into one more of the liquid variety.

Anyway.

I love breakfast. Problem: I'm never awake early enough to eat it. SO this was the perfect opportunity to whip up one of my all time favorites: Monkey bread.

You will need:

1/2 cup sugar
1-2 tsp cinnamon depending on how much you dig it
2 tbsp brown sugar (do me a favor and pretend it's in the picture)
1/4 cup of butter (1/2 a stick)
1 package of canned biscuits - non flaky kind... and hopefully not as gigantic as the ones I picked up.

Start by preheating your oven to 350 degrees, (or 315 if your oven hates you, like mine).

Next, open up the can of biscuits!

You'll want to cut these into smaller pieces. If you only have the huge ones because you're a glutton, just cut them into 6ths... if you have the normal ones, like normal people, cut them into the fourths. We can clearly see which category of people I fell under.

Next, you'll want to combine the cinnamon and regular sugar into a zip lock bag. Plop these biscuit babies in there, and give it a shake until they're all coated. They shouldn't stick together once everything is coated! It might be easier to plop in a handful at a time.

Can we time out a second? Look at these.

DON'T ACT LIKE YOU'RE NOT IMPRESSED.

Cough. Sorry. I get excited about colors.

....

Now, take your butter and brown sugar and put those in a small bowl. Micro for about 1 minute and stir until its all one color.

Then plop the cinnamon biscuits into a bundt pan. If you don't have one, use the only cake pan you actually own.

Then, drizzle the butter mixture all over your biscuits. No big deal if it doesn't fully cover, although according to Pioneer Woman, you'll need a cup of butter and it needs to be fully drenched and overflowing. See, I'm looking out for your waist line here.

Now just toss it in the oven and give it about 25 - 35 minutes!

Is this what heaven smells like? I think so. My apartment smells like love. I bet the neighbors are totally jealous.

Take it out of the oven when the top has a nice brown color, like this!

Ok so the easiest way to get this outta there without breaking it is to flip it. To do that, just flip your plate upside down and put it on top of the cake pan, then, holding both the plate and the cake, turn it the right way up! Does that make any sense at all?

Good thing there are pictures to help. The cake should just slip out of the pan. Thank you butter!

Oh hello beautiful. Come closer....

Mmmmm. Technically you should let this cool for like 10 minutes. Psssh... good luck.

You don't blame me, right? It's fabulous, try it soon!

<3 Courtzilla

Rainbow Bday Cupcakes

2009-06-11T23:02:00.006-05:00

Tomorrow is my good friend Brenda's birthday party. To celebrate, I wanted to bake her something... when I asked what she wanted, she said "anything with cream cheese frosting". Oh good, that narrows it down. I love color. I love dinosaurs. I'm going to make rainbow dinosaur cupcakes with cream cheese frosting.

Oh, I went there.

These didn't turn out as nice as I had hoped. They're a pretty good flavor, but the layers were a big fail, and I definitely used 23432 times too much batter in the first batch. They puffed up way higher than normal, which probably had something to do with the excess batter. Try them yourself and let me know how they go... they were still cute and delicious!

Oh, and I got the original recipe here.

You will need (for 10 cupcakes):
1 cup all purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup buttermilk - remember that sweet trick I taught you?
1 tsp vanilla extract
red, yellow, green and blue food colorings

Okay, first you'll want to combine the flour, baking powder, and salt in a medium sized bowl. Like so.

Next, combine the sugar, eggs, vanilla, oil, and buttermilk in a large bowl.

Add the flour mixture slowly to the egg mixture, stirring as you go. In a bit, you'll end up with something like this!

Now for the fun part. Divide the batter into 5 smaller bowls. Add food coloring to each bowl. For the rainbow, I used blue, green, yellow, orange, and red. Where's violet and indigo you say? I say bite me.

See how much batter I used? Don't do what I did. Only do one spoon full for each layer. Trust me.

To make the layers, put the blue in first, then green, then yellow, then orange, and top it off with red. It should look something like this.... but hopefully you're more patient than I am because I clearly started to get lazy.

Then, let these suckers bake at 350 degrees for 15 minutes.

Holy rise batman!

I didn't take pictures of me making the frosting, so sue me. It's basically 1/2 stick of butter and an 8oz package of cream cheese blended together. Then, you add 1 tsp of vanilla extract and anywhere from 2 1/2 to 4 cups of powdered sugar and mix it all together. Simple, tasty, I wish it was fluffier. Today was not my cupcake day. Anyway.... So I swirled some cream cheese glaze over the cakes... and added some decor.

Hahah! Look at these beauts! With the small bit of leftover batter, I made little cookie sized bites for my roommate to nibble on.

Ok and maybe one or two for me too.

I think he's my favorite.

Enjoy!

Oh... another tip... make sure to wash your hands after using the food dye, especially if it's the concentrated kind like mine. Looks like my hands got sunburned. Sexy.

Have a great weekend!

<3 Courtzilla

Egg McDoityourselfMuffin

2009-06-11T09:50:00.006-05:00

It may come as a surprise... ok it's obvious if you know me at all, I worship the McDonald's breakfast. I don't really eat there too often, unless it's before 10:30am. There's just something about what they put in an Egg McMuffin that gets my engines going. However, I feel like a fatass everytime I go, and in reality these are a cinch to put together. Follow my lead! And shun the Hot Cakes.

You will need:
- An egg
- A english muffin
- A slice of cheese (Kraft Singles, let's keep it real)
- Ham/Sausage/Bacon - whatever
- Salt & Pepper

First! You'll want to get an english muffin, and tear it in half, like so.

Wow, pictures look 10x better in natural light! After you're done marveling at your photographic skillz, place the english muffin in your toaster and...well toast it.

While it's toasting, grab a nonstick pan and spray it with a little canola oil or whatever. Butter/Marg will work too.

Drop your egg in. Don't worry if it gets a little messy, you can just use a fork and kinda pile the outsides on top of itself, like I did. When the egg is almost done on one side, I just plopped a piece of ham on there. The ham's already cooked, so it doesn't take long at all, but if you're doing bacon or sausage or something else, you'll want to start with that.

I also break the yolk, because runny eggs creep me out. Feel free to skip this step if you enjoy the runny-ness. I'm going for authenticity here.

Ok! After that you just flip both the ham and egg over, and continue cooking until the other side of the egg is finished. In the meantime, take your toasted english muffin, and add a slice of cheese to it. No need to put the cheese in the toaster and make a mess, it'll melt just fine when all the hot ingredients are added.

Then, throw on your ham...

Then your egg!

At this point, I added a little salt and pepper, then put the top onto the muffin. Add tobasco if you've got balls. I don't. There, I said it.

I'm Canadian, so it's pretty much a given that I'm going to add ketchup.

Although this would be great with steak sauce, or just plain!

Literally, this took maybe 5 minutes. It's perfect for an on the go, healthy breakfast! Serve it with some fruit if you want to round it out a bit, and a big glass of milk.

Hello beautiful.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

The BEST mashed potatoes ever.

2009-06-06T23:14:00.006-05:00

These, ladies and gents, are so good. SO DELICIOUS. My roommate makes boxed mashed potatoes, and I cringe in horror every time I see it out of the pantry. Why? Why bother making mashed potatoes if they aren't THESE mashed potatoes? Isn't it like eating cardboard? Ugh, I am shuddering as I type this. UGH.

You will need: (this is for the full recipe, I only made about 1/3...one person and all)
- 5lb russet or yukon taters
- 1 stick of salted butter (I only had unsalted, but you can always add salt later)
- 1 8oz package of cream cheese
- salt, pepper
- 1/2 cup milk or cream
- whatever seasonings you like

Yup that's it. It's the cream cheese that's key, it makes the taters so creamy. They turn out perfect every time.

To start, peel the potatoes, and rinse them off in cool water.

Once they're peeled and rinsed, chop them up into smaller pieces. This just makes them boil a bit faster, and more evenly.

Find a pot and dump the taters in it. Pour water in so it just covers the taters. Throw the pot on the stove top, and bring to a boil.

You'll want to boil these for about a half hour, or until they are fork tender... aka, you can stick a fork in them with no resistance. They shouldn't be falling apart, but you want them done enough so you can mash them with minimal lumpage. Ha, lumpage. That's a fun word.

Alrighty, once that's taken care of, drain the taters and put them back in the pot. The best way to mash them is to put them back on the stove, and turn the heat on to low. This will get rid of any lingering water. Mash them up with a handy dandy potato masher. I love my potato masher! I've done this with a fork before, but man, so much easier with a masher.

My hand looks like an alien. Moving on. You'll want to keep mashing till it gets to about this consistency.

Once you've reached this stage, you can go ahead and turn the stove off. Now you'll be needing all of these fixin's.

I added paprika for some additional seasoning, but you could easily use cayenne or something to give it a bit of a kick. Or onion soup mix. Or garlic powder. Or if you're reallll fancy you can add some roasted garlic. Go ahead and add all the ingredients all at once. Oh man. Oh bejesus. Check out the creamy that is this photo.

I added a bit of milk to thin it out a tad. You definitely want to taste it. I needed to add way more salt since I only had unsalted butter. I then smoothed it out in a baking dish.

Now at this point you can cover it and use it for later, which is awesome. If you want to do that, just put some butter on top and bake it at 350 for about 20 minutes! It's great if you're having people over and won't have time to cook everything all at once.

Now this is good to go from here. Unless you're Courtzilla, and have a pension for meddling. I went ahead and whipped up this really fancy gravy to spoon over it.

Now I won't list the recipe here, it's farrrr to difficult for most home cooks. Only the truly gourmet would even attempt to make it.

Oh dear, how did that photo get in here?

No matter.

This was so good.

Serve them with mini meatloaf meatballs! Maybe I'll make those tomorrow. It's either that or penne alla vodka. Anyone have a preference? Leave a comment.

Enjoy.

<3 Courtzilla

(Who is, yes, staying in, eating mashed potatoes, writing a blog post, and watching Pride and Prejudice on a Saturday night. It's like I just got dumped or something.)

Lazy Man's Chicken

2009-06-03T21:28:00.008-05:00

You know when you get home from work, want a cooked meal, but you have about 4 ingredients and no time? That's where this dish comes in. It's totally a lazy weekday meal. Take a mediocre amount of planning, and some thievery, but we'll get to that in a second. It's....

BBQ Citrus Chicken.

This is seriously a great summer dish, and would be awesome on the grill. And... it's so simple!! Probably one of the simplest dishes in my head, but oh so good. I don't even remember where I got this... and I don't exactly take measurements. Onto the food!

You will need:
- some sort of citrus-y juice
- BBQ sauce
- whatever part of the chicken you heart best (i used chicken boob)
- salt, pepper
- a bit of oil for the pan/grill
- oranges (optional)

The thing that makes this dish great is that it's so easy, and yet the chicken comes out juicy and flavorful every time. The trick is in the marinade. It's all about marinade, baby.

To start, you'll need... this!

Start by putting the chicken in a ziplock bag. I used 2 chicken breasts so I can have leftovers for lunch.

Then, add about 1/2 - 1 cup of orange juice. Now, I didn't have any orange juice. So if you're like me, you'll steal your roommates orange pineapple juice. Stealing is good for the soul, and makes a hell of a marinade.

After that's done, put in around 1/2 - 1 cup of BBQ sauce.

Squish everything together, so that the chicken is evenly coated. Throw it in the fridge and forgeddabouddit. I would suggest at least an hour. What I did was put this all together the night before (takes about 4 minutes) and ate my cake and went to bed. When I got home from work today, these babies were defrosted, super flavorful, and ready to go on the grill.

So when you're ready to grill these, take them out of the bag and get rid of the marinade. You don't want to use it for basting or anything because it's got all the raw chicken juices in there. Yechhhh. Sprinkle the chicken with salt and pepper on each side.

Now, at this point it's really cool if you don't live in a basement, and you have a grill. However, for us poor suckers who live in tiny basement apartments, I can't tell you how much I love my new grill pan (thanks mom)! It gets beautiful char marks on the food and almost makes me think I'm outside. If you have a grill pan (just a skillet would work fine too), pour just a bit of olive oil on it and spread it around. This will make the chicken not stick to the pan.

Throw those suckers on there and let 'em have it. My stove was on medium heat. They were probably on the grill about 5-6 minutes each side, since I'm paranoid about chicken not being fully cooked.

I didn't get a picture of it, but I basted each side with just the plain BBQ sauce, just for some more flavor. If you want to get really fancy schmancy you can cut up an orange and grill those too for presentation - the char of the grill will make all the natural sugars carmelize. However, being as the title of this post is lazy man's chicken, I decided to go with the spirit of the post and not do it.

One thing I did realize was that man cannot eat chicken alone. I made a quick salad! I used these ingredients, since I thought they would be nice with the pineapple-orange flavors of the chicken.

If you can't tell, that's grapes, romaine, pineapple chunks, blueberries, a golden delicious apple, and feta cheese. You can basically throw in any fruit you've got and it would be fine. This would be devine with strawberries, maybe with pecans or almonds for some crunch.

In a perfect world, I would have poppyseed dressing to throw on top of this. However, Courtzilla is not perfect, and I think I ate it all in a drunk stupor. So, I had to substitute with some raspberry pecan dressing, which was still scrumptious. I mean, just look at it.

Once your chicken is done, throw that on the side, and VOILA! Lazy man's dinner.

This is kind of a crappy shot, but I was too busy eating to get another one. I had some leftover corn bread that I had on the side with a bit of butter. It was delicious, and took about 15 minutes to throw together. How's that for a meal?

<3 Courtzilla

Blueberry Buttermilk Cake

2009-06-01T21:18:00.015-05:00

Ho. Ho boy. When I came home today I had no intentions of making this. I was going to make meatballs. And mashed potatoes. And asparagus.

Then I looked in the fridge.... and realized I had about a quart of blueberries that weren't going to make it much longer. What to make what to make....

THIS.

- Photo and original recipe are from Smitten Kitchen, Deb is a genius people.

This is so much more than just a cake people. It's transcendent. Light, fluffy, and wonderfully blueberry-ey. And this time, I took pictures. Look I'm learning!

List of ingredients:
- 1 cup flour
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/2 stick (1/4 cup) softened butter (I used unsalted)
- 2/3 cup sugar, plus a bit more to sprinkle over the top later
- 1/2 tsp vanilla
- 1 egg
- about 1 cup of blueberries or whatever other berry you want to put in there.
- 1/2 cup buttermilk... who keeps buttermilk you ask? No one. So first I'll show you how to make it.

Ok... a ton of my favorite recipes have buttermilk in them, but I clearly don't make with buttermilk on a daily basis. That's why this little trick is handy.

For buttermilk, you'll need:

No, I'm serious. That's it. A good rule of thumb is that for every cup of milk, add 1 tbsp of vinegar, then let it sit for 10 minutes. Stir, and voila! Buttermilk. Note the wine glass in the background. Pure class.

On to cake!

- Start by pre-heating your oven to 400 degrees, unless your oven is like mine and loves to burn things. In my case, I lowered it to 325 degrees.

- Butter and flour a 9" circular cake pan. Or use one of those fancy flour in a can thingers. But I can't be bothered with fancy things like that.

Just butter it.... then drop like a tablespoon of flour in the pan, and tap it around over the sink so it spreads all over, and looks like this:

Once that's done, we'll need these characters.

Whisk your flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a medium sized bowl. Set this dry mixture to the side.

Next, we'll need these ingredients. Low fat butter is for wusses.

You'll want to beat the butter and sugar until it turns a light yellow, and gets pretty fluffy. It's at this point where I wish I had an electric mixer. Alas, this was probably the best work out my arm has gotten in about a month.

Once that's done, add an egg and the vanilla. It should look like this when you're done.

Ok, so here's where it gets a little tricky...ok so not really. Basically you want to dump in about 1/3 the flour, mix it together, dump in 1/2 the buttermilk, mix, flour, mix, buttermilk, mix, end of the flour, mix until just combined. Make sense? 1/3 the flour each time, 1/2 the buttermilk in between when you mix in the flour. Why do we do this? I have no idea.

Plop it into your pan, and scatter the blueberries all over the place. Sprinkle the top with sugar.

Yipes, it started to look like Courtzilla had taken over again. Sad part - this is me trying to be neat.

Back to the cake.

Yummo.

Bake for 20 - 25 minutes. This is what it looked like after about 10 minutes in my burn-happy oven.

But Courtney, you ask, how will I know it's done? AH HA! Another trick.

Take a knife and stick it in the middle of your cake. If you pull it out, and it comes away clean, the cake is good to go.

If you pull it out, and it looks like this...

Back in the oven. This is what it looked like when I pulled it out, about another 8 minutes later.

YUM. But.... it's missing something. Something to throw it over the top in true Courtzilla fashion. Cream cheese glaze? Yes please. And it couldn't be easier.

Characters:
Blatant self promotion. Check out that SWEET Sconnie pen.

Mix together 3 tbsp of cream cheese and 3 tbsp of milk. Make sure the cream cheese is softened, or else you'll get weird lumps in the glaze. Then, add 1 cup of powdered sugar and mix. Should be about this consistancy when you pull your fork away.

Drizzle over your cake. I added a couple of fresh blueberries to the top... because I CAN.

Oh man. Oh yum. Couldn't help myself, had to take a bite.

I then managed to eat a huge slice for dinner.

Didn't miss those meatballs one bit.

Enjoy!

<3 Courtzilla

The poll...

2009-06-01T10:13:00.003-05:00

Ok guys,.... seriously? This poll on the right? It's a 4 way tie. There are only 4 options.

Haha.

You are NOT helping me with my indecisive nature.

<3 Courtzilla

It's sweet. It's tangy. It's Creamy Macaroni...er.. Bowtie Salad.

2009-05-31T21:17:00.004-05:00

Ah ha! The first recipe, and one that I just got done making. In the future I'll be taking step by step photos, because it is my feeling that you can never have enough food photos on your blog. Plus, I secretly want to be Ree Drummond from The Pioneer Woman Cooks.

So. It's a summer staple. Macaroni salad. I'm always tempted to buy those tubs of macaroni salad at the supermarket, but then I look at the fat content and a part of my insides dies a little. Not that I'm normally preoccupied with such things as fat content... but I like to pretend I am when I'm being judged by fellow grocery shoppers.

Anyway. Why buy store bought when it's so easy to make yourself? Like seriously, I had the dressing for this done in the time it took to boil the pasta. No big deal. I also tweaked the recipe a bit... one of the major problems being I had no elbow macaroni. So.... bowtie pasta it is!

What you'll need... (this is what I used for a 4 serving recipe, just FYI)

- 1 and a 1/2 cups of uncooked pasta
- 1/3 a cup of mayo - I used light mayo. It's all about fat content.
- 1/4 a cup of sugar
- 1 tablespoon of distilled white vinegar
- teaspoon or so of yellow mustard - I used spicy brown, because I'm a rebel.
- pinch of salt
- pinch of pepper
- 1/4 of a sweet onion, finely diced
- 1 stalk of celery, finely diced
- some diced carrot... I legitimately used 4 baby carrots. I have issues.
- bout a 1/3 cup of frozen peas

Ok so the original recipe called for green pepper, and didn't have peas in it at all. It also listed the carrots as optional, along with pimentos. I have never bought pimentos, so those were out, and I went to chop up some green pepper, only to find it was mushy. Does this happen to anyone else, or is that just me? How did I go grocery shopping today, then go to cook only to find out I'm out of elbow macaroni and I only have one squishy pepper. Epic fail Courtzilla, epic fail.

Anyway.

- Now. Boil the pasta in salted water. Cook until just tender.
- Meanwhile, combine all of your dressing ingredients in a pretty big bowl. Add in all the chopped veggies into the dressing... clearly just put in whatever veggies you've got on hand. I chop everything really fine because big chunks of texture creeps me out.
- Fold that all together. Once the pasta is finished, drain it. I ran mine through with cold water so it wouldn't be hot when you added it to the mayo... icky.
- Throw the pasta in with the dressing and mix.

At this point if you're me, you decided you wanted to add peas because it's not green enough and you've got authority problems. I just put the frozen peas in a coliander and ran them under hot water until they thawed out, and tossed 'em in the pasta.

Cover with cling wrap or whatever, and throw into the fridge! Let it mingle there for like an hour or so, although overnight is best. This just gives everyone in the bowl a chance to get to know each other and start making friends.

Devour.

If you wanted to reduce the calories even more, use a multigrain or wheat pasta, and you can switch out the sugar with splenda. Actually the sugar could be toned down a bit too, this is a pretty sweet dressing.

It's that easy, folks. This is so easy, I almost feel bad posting it. Definitely not enough disaster or destruction going on.

<3 Courtzilla

Courtzilla: Origins

2009-05-31T20:37:00.003-05:00

Oh no. It has begun. I've been contemplating starting up another blog for a while, and it hit me today.

I need somewhere to save my recipes.

See, I experiment. A lot. And then I forget to save whatever scrap of paper I wrote down everything on. Then I get angry and go on a Courtzilla rampage.

This is my attempt at preventing rampages. It's for the good of all mankind really. You should be thanking me right now.

To understand this blog, you must have an understanding of me.

Courtzilla is my drunken alter ego. She's sassy. She's destructive. Best of all, she's hungry. I don't get in this state often, but when I do ... oh man.

I feel like when I cook, Courtzilla often takes over. I wake up from a daze. The kitchen is a disaster, two bottles of wine are missing, and I have a massive amount of food in front of me. I make probably about 2352 times too much food everytime I cook. I'm not neat, and I'm not organized, but damn, I can cook. I'm working on the baking thing, but cooking I have down.

So, hold hands, don't be scared. This is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

<3 Courtzilla