Orange Nutty Coffee Cake

When we were living in Tennessee, one of the ladies in our Sunday school class invited all of us women over for a Christmas brunch one year. She made a coffee cake that was out of this world! I got the recipe from her and made it quite a few times in the coming years. At some point during one of our North Carolina moves I lost the recipe. I searched and searched and finally this past year found it again online thanks to Pinterest! 

We love making this recipe on Christmas eve morning. 

The dough has cream cheese in each piece which makes the bites so yummy and rich! I typically leave out the pecans when I make it for just us.

Orange Nutty Coffee Cake 

3/4 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup chopped pecans

2 teaspoons orange zest

2 (12-ounce) cans refrigerated buttermilk biscuits (10 count)

1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese

1/2 cup (1 stick) melted butter

1 cup sifted confectioners' sugar

2 tablespoons fresh orange juice

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

In a small bowl, combine the granulated sugar, pecans, and zest; set aside. Separate the biscuits. Place about 3/4 teaspoon cream cheese in the center of each biscuit. Fold each biscuit in half over the cheese, pressing the edges to seal. Dip the biscuits in melted butter, then dredge in the granulated sugar mixture. Place the biscuits, curved-side down, in a single layer in the hollows of a lightly greased 12-cup bundt pan, spacing them evenly (do not stack). Place any remaining biscuits around the tube, filling any gaps. Drizzle any remaining butter over the biscuits, and sprinkle with any remaining sugar mixture. Bake for 35 to 40 minutes, until golden brown. Immediately invert the cake onto a serving platter. Combine the confectioners' sugar and orange juice, stirring well; drizzle the glaze over the warm cake. Serve warm.

"Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him!" Psalm 34:8

Recent Recipes ♨

So I've had these recipes sitting in my draft folder for months now. Finally getting around to writing them out and sharing. This first one is for my Sicilian Meat Roll which I have been making for quite a few years now. I just realized this past summer that I didn't have it listed here on the blog. I love to switch up our regular meat loaf recipe with this one at times. 

Sicilian Meat Roll 

3/4 cup Italian bread crumbs 

2 eggs 

1/4 cup tomato juice 

2 Tablespoons dry Italian seasoning 

2 pounds ground beef 

8 thin slices fully cooked deli ham 

shredded or sliced Mozzarella cheese 

In a large bowl, mix together bread crumbs, eggs, tomato juice, seasoning, and ground beef. Mix with your hands until well combined. On a 9x13 sheet of wax paper carefully pat out meat into a regular shape and to 1/4 inch thickness leaving a margin between meat and edge of wax paper. Once meat is evenly spread out, place your sliced ham on top of meat and top with shredded mozzarella cheese. 

Carefully use the wax paper to roll up your meat roll from long side, sealing all edges. 

Place in greased baking dish and bake for approx. 40 minutes at 350 degrees. Check to make sure meat is done. Sprinkle with additional mozzarella cheese on top and put back in oven for 5 minutes more until cheese melts. *Note- the inside of your meat roll will be pink colored from the ham. Serve with mashed potatoes and gravy. 

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This next recipe is one I found on Pinterest this past summer. We made it multiple times during the harvest of our strawberries from our garden this year. Everyone that I made it for loved it. 

Strawberry Pizza 

Crust:

1 C flour

1/4 C powdered sugar

1/2 C butter

Filling:

1 (8 oz.) cream cheese, room temperature

1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

1/2 C granulated sugar

1/4 tsp. freshly squeezed lemon juice

Topping:

1 C fresh strawberries, mashed

4 Tbsp. granulated sugar

1 Tbsp. cornstarch

8 - 10 strawberries sliced.

In a medium bowl, combine flour, sugar and butter. Form into a ball with hands and press onto an un-greased pizza pan. Bake at 325 degrees for 15 minutes. Cool. In a medium bowl, combine cream cheese, vanilla, sugar and lemon juice. Spread on cooled crust. In a saucepan over medium heat, combine strawberries, sugar and cornstarch. Simmer until thick and glossy. Cool. Spread on top of cream cheese filling. Slice strawberries in half and place on pizza. Enjoy! 

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Throwing in a few more recent recipes that we have enjoyed this fall...........

Apple Dumplings 

This recipe is Pioneer Woman's. I made one slight change though....her original recipe calls for Mountain Dew and I hate Mountain Dew so I switched it to Sprite. 

4 whole Granny Smith Apples

2 cans (8 Oz. Cans) Crescent Rolls

2 sticks Butter

1-1/2 cup Sugar

1 teaspoon Vanilla

 Cinnamon, To Taste

1 can (12 Oz.) Sprite

Peel and core apples. Cut each apple into 8 slices each. Roll each apple slice in a crescent roll. Place in a 9 x 13 buttered pan. Melt butter, then add sugar and barely stir. Add vanilla, stir, and pour entire mixture over apples. Pour Sprite around the edges of the pan. Sprinkle with cinnamon and bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes. Serve with ice cream, and spoon some of the sweet sauces from the pan over the top.

These are soooo amazing! And I love that they are so quick and easy too. 

Meatball Stroganoff 

This was a Pinterest find that we have now enjoyed a couple of times.

Ingredients: 

Frozen meatballs- enough to cover (crowded like) into the bottom of a large skillet

1 Tbsp. extra virgin olive oil 

1 1/2-2 cans of beef broth 

1 1/2 tsp. Italian seasoning 

Salt & Pepper 

1 cup sour cream 

1 cup heavy whipping cream 

1- 1 1/2 bags of wide egg noodles 

Place your oil in skillet and swirl to cover the bottom of pan. Place all your meatballs (frozen) in pan. Saute in oil, turning meatballs every few minutes, until they have all browned. You will get some pieces from the meatballs that stick to your skillet despite the oil- don't worry- it all eventually blends and adds to the flavor. Once your meatballs are browned de-glaze them by pouring your beef broth over. Bring to a boil and add your seasonings (salt and pepper to taste). Boil for approx. 6-8 minutes until liquid starts to reduce a little. During this time start boiling your noodles in a separate pan of water. I also use this time of boiling to cut our meatballs in half. I do so with a spatula right in the pan as they are boiling. We prefer large pieces of meatballs rather than whole meatballs with our dish. Add your sour cream and heaving whipping cream. These act as a thickener and give the sauce its creaminess. When your noodles are done, drain, and add to meatball mixture. Stir to combine and serve hot. 

I have made several meatball stroganoffs through the years and the reason I really like this one is that it makes a lot of sauce to cover the noodles and that sauce has a real beefy flavor to it. It all just blends well and tastes so hearty. 

 "Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God." 

1 Corinthians 10:39

Edible Pine Cones

Bryan has been off this week on vacation. It's his week off before camp season gets really crazy for him. We didn't go anywhere but instead have been working on a few projects around the house, resting, and we've enjoyed doing some local things together. I didn't manage to get any posts written before his vacation started, thus the quiet week here on the blog. Here is a quick one though of a project we did in February. 

We had been reading about plants in winter and the science behind pine cones and we made these edible pine cones just for fun. We thought they turned out really pretty and they sure were yummy to eat! 

To make them we took a thick pretzel stick and a mixture of peanut butter, Nutella, butter, and powdered sugar and mixed it all together good. We molded the mixture around the pretzel stick. 

Then holding the top of the pretzel stick we stuck in pieces of Chex chocolate cereal at an angle and layered the cereal pieces all over the mold. 

We clipped the top of the pretzel stick with scissors and added a bit more peanut butter mixture to the top of the pine cone and a few broken pieces of cereal. Then sprinkled with powdered sugar. 

To make 4 pine cones we used the following, 

3 cups cereal 

4 pretzel sticks 

1/2 cup peanut butter 

1/4 cup Nutella 

3 tablespoons butter, softened 

1 cup powdered sugar 

"The glory of Lebanon shall come to you, the cypress, the plane, and the pine, to beautify the place of my sanctuary, and I will make the place of my feet glorious." Isaiah 60:13 

Recent Recipes

{new recipes we tried and loved}

Cinnamon Scones 

2 cups flour 

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup butter

1 egg, separated

3 Tablespoons honey

1/3 cup buttermilk (or 1/3 cup milk mixed with 1/2 teaspoon of lemon juice)

Crumb Topping:

1-2 Tablespoons sugar

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

Glaze Ingredients:

1 cup powdered sugar (you can make your own homemade unprocessed powered sugar)

1-3 teaspoons milk

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Cut in butter until mixture is crumbly. Separate the egg white and yolk. Set the egg white aside. In a separate bowl, mix egg yolk, honey and buttermilk (or milk/lemon juice mixture). Add to the dry ingredients and stir until just combined. Form dough into a ball on a floured surface. Roll or pat out to half an inch in thickness and eight inches in diameter. Cut into eight equally-sized pieces. Transfer to a greased baking sheet. Whisk the egg white until froth forms and brush over the tops of scones. Mix sugar and cinnamon together and sprinkle over egg-white-topped scones. Bake at 400 degrees for 10 to 12 minutes.

Mix together powdered sugar, milk and vanilla until glaze forms. Drizzle over scones after they bake.

Pumpkin Pancakes 

1.5 cups of milk

4 Tbsp vinegar

2 cups all-purpose flour

4 Tbsp brown sugar

2 tsp baking powder

1tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

2 tsp allspice

2 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp ginger

2 eggs

4 Tbsp melted butter

1.5 cups pumpkin puree

Mix all together and cook on hot griddle. 

Spaghetti Casserole 

I always make enough spaghetti that we have leftovers. The only thing we don't really like about leftover spaghetti is that after sitting the noodles always seem like it needs more sauce. I found this recipe on Pinterest and have used it with our leftover spaghetti recently. It is now our solution to making leftover spaghetti taste fresh again. 

16-oz. pkg. spaghetti noodles, cooked

2-24 oz. jars spaghetti sauce

1 lb. ground beef, browned

1 lb. ground Italian pork sausage, browned

1/4 c. butter

1/4 c. all-purpose flour

1/2 c. grated Parmesan cheese

2 t. salt

1/2 t. garlic powder

12-oz. can evaporated milk

3 c. shredded Italian cheese blend, divided

Garnish: chopped fresh parsley

Combine spaghetti noodles, spaghetti sauce, ground beef and sausage in a large bowl, set aside. Melt butter in a saucepan over medium heat; add flour, Parmesan cheese, salt and garlic powder, stirring constantly until smooth and bubbly. Add evaporated milk and one cup Italian cheese blend, stir until thickened. Pour half of spaghetti noodle mixture into a greased 13"x9” casserole dish and pour cheese mixture over top. Pour remaining noodle mixture into dish; top with remaining 2 cups Italian cheese blend. Bake uncovered at 350 degrees for 25 to 30 minutes. Sprinkle with parsley. Makes 12 to 18 servings

Chicken Queso Chili with Roasted Corn & Bell Pepper

Oh my goodness....this soup was so delicious! It was a Pinterest find from last month and has been made twice now in our home. I altered the recipe some from the original to suit our family better. 

1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breasts

3 cups picante sauce, divided

1½ cups water

1 teaspoon cumin

2 teaspoons chili powder

½ teaspoon salt

1 bell pepper, minced

1 14 ounce can corn, rinsed and drained

1 jalapeno pepper, minced (without ribs and seeds)- optional

1 14 ounce can black beans, rinsed and drained (can substitute with another bean type) 

4 ounces light cream cheese

6 ounces Pepper Jack cheese or your favorite cheese 

cilantro for topping

blue corn tortilla chips for yummy dippin’

Place the chicken breasts, 1½ cups picante sauce, water, cumin, chili powder and salt in the crockpot. Cover and cook on high for 3-4 hours or low for 6-7 hours. When the chicken is done, shred the meat directly in the crockpot using two forks.

Pat the minced peppers dry with a paper towel. Place the bell peppers in a large nonstick skillet over high heat without oil. Cook for 4-5 minutes WITHOUT stirring. This creates the browned, roasted look out on the outside of the peppers. Stir once and repeat until the peppers are nice and browned. Set aside. Repeat this process with the corn and jalapeño together. I did not use the jalapeno in our soup but if your prefer a hotter soup- then go for it. 

After the chicken has been shredded, add the roasted peppers, roasted corn and jalapeño, black beans, remaining picante sauce, and cream cheese to the crockpot. Stir and replace cover, allowing the cream cheese to melt. Adjust the consistency of the soup by adding another ½ cup of water if needed. Let the soup simmer for another 15-30 minutes until everything is smooth and melted. Just before serving, stir in the Pepper Jack cheese.

*You can use salsa instead of picante sauce. Our family just prefers picante. We also added in a can of diced potatoes to our soup just because we had been given a can and had it on hand. 

Snow Ice Cream!

We made snow ice cream with some of the snow fall we got this past week. We used the above recipe. 

We gathered up 18 cups of freshly fallen snow and have some stored in the freezer to make more snow ice cream at a later time. I thought it might be fun to save until this summer. 

Ally adding the milk. 

Dark chocolate peppermint syrup. Sooo yummy! 

"The first fall of snow is not only an event, it is a magical event. You go to bed in one kind of a world and wake up in another quite different, and if this is not enchantment then where is it to be found?"

~ J. B. Priestley

Pumpkin Gooey Cake

I found this recipe on Pinterest at the start of fall and it sounded very interesting. I made it for just our family around mid-October and it was a huge hit with everyone. I love pumpkin pie. I LOVED this pumpkin gooey cake! Bryan likes pumpkin pie but it isn't a favorite of his. He REALLY LIKED this pumpkin gooey cake though. All of the kids LOVED this cake! I made it again for our FIAR group gathering in October and it was a big hit with everyone then too. We ended up making this cake instead of Pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving this year. 

It starts with a yellow cake mix for the bottom. The recipe calls for a boxed yellow cake mix. I didn't have one on hand the first time I made this so I just used a homemade yellow cake mix. This is the base for the cake. Either way- boxed or homemade- is yummy. Just be sure and use your really large baking dish 9x13 or larger or your cake will be really thick. 

GOOEY PUMPKIN CAKE: 

1 (18 1/4oz.) yellow cake mix

8 Tbsp. (1 cube) butter, melted

1 egg

FILLING:

1 (15 oz.) can pumpkin

1 8oz. pkg. cream cheese

3 eggs

1 tsp. vanilla extract

8 Tbsp. butter, melted

1 tsp. cinnamon

1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg

1 (16 oz.) pkg. powdered sugar

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Mix together the cake mix, 8 Tbs. butter and egg.  Lightly spray a 9x13 pan with cooking spray and pour the cake mixture into the bottom of the pan. In a bowl, mix together the filling by first mixing the pumpkin and cream cheese together till smooth. Add the eggs, vanilla, butter and beat together. Mix in the cinnamon, nutmeg and powdered sugar. Pour over the top of the cake mixture. Bake for 40-50 minutes. (It will depend on your oven, I cooked mine for 50 minutes) Don't over cook, you want it to not be completely set in the middle. Let it cool at least 15 minutes before serving.

Oh my goodness this cake is soooo good! I had a little less than the called for amount of pumpkin the first time I made this and it still turned out. 

Here is a picture of it from Thanksgiving when I had the full amount of pumpkin that the recipe calls for. 

If your a pumpkin lover I highly recommend this one and if your not that fond of pumpkin I actually recommend this one too as the couple of people in my family that are not big pumpkin fans actually really liked it in this dish. This one will be hitting our table again and again. I love it when I find keepers like this! 

"Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God." 1 Corinthians 10:31

Homemade Crescent Rolls

I have a handful of recipes that call for crescent rolls. They are all recipes our family loves and ones we like to do often. Here in our neck of the woods the price of crescent rolls almost doubled this past year. I pay a little over 2$ for one roll of them at Walmart. With the size of our family our recipes often require 4 or more rolls per recipe/dish. That means the cost is 8$ for just the crescent rolls. For this reason, I became determined to find a homemade recipe that worked well and tasted good and with the help of Pinterest, I succeeded! Gosh, I sure do love Pinterest! 

Look at that beautiful dough! It rises so beautifully! I do the dough in this recipe in my bread machine so it couldn't be easier. 

Crescent Roll Recipe: 

1 T. yeast

1/4 cup sugar

1/2 c. warm water

1/2 c. warm milk

1/2 c. butter, softened or melted

1 egg

1/2 t. salt

4 c. flour

Heat water and milk in microwave and add to bread machine pan. Add yeast and sugar and let sit for 5 minutes. Add butter, egg, salt, and flour. Tap pan to level out ingredients. Place in bread machine on dough cycle. When finished roll out on a greased pizza pan. 

This dough rolls out so beautifully each time and it slices right up with no issues. It always makes me smile. It makes enough for two pizza size roll outs and the number of crescent rolls you get depends on how big or small you cut them. As you can see from the picture I just use a pizza cutter and slice just like I do for pizza. I typically slice 14 crescents out of each pile of dough so we get 28 crescent rolls from the recipe above.

That is always enough to make our chicken crescent roll ups which are pictured here. I've been making this recipe for years and it's a family favorite. All I do is cook a whole chicken or chicken breasts and shred the meat. Add shredded cheese of choice to chicken and the put spoonfuls on each crescent roll and roll up. Place in greased baking dish. Mix 2 cans cream of chicken soup with one can of milk till blended well and pour over crescent rolls. Bake at 350 for around 40 minutes. You can add any veggies you like to the chicken and cheese mixture and topping with more cheese is always yummy. Bryan noticed right away how much better the homemade crescent rolls bake up compared to the store bought in this recipe. 

My homemade crescent rolls in my Kentucky Brown Bake dish. For this recipe I just roll out the crescent roll dough in the shape of my baking dish and then transfer it over. I've shared this recipe previously here on our blog so you can find it under my recipe file if your interested. 

And of course you can just roll up and bake like normal too. 

Recent Recipes

Homemade Crescent Rolls 

I have several recipes that use crescent rolls. I don't know about where you live but here near us the cost the all food has really gone up this past year. Crescent rolls jumped almost 40cents a pack higher. I've wondered for a while now about making homemade crescent rolls and wondered if they would work as well in my recipes as the canned ones. Saw a recipe on Pinterest and gave it a shot. 

LOVED it! I love how nicely this recipe sliced up and rolled. I won't be buying canned ones anymore. This was much cheaper and healthier and because I did the dough in my bread machine it was super easy too. 

Ingredients: 

1 T. yeast

1 t. sugar

1/2 c. warm water

1/2 c. warm milk

1/2 c. butter, softened or melted

1 egg

1/2 t. salt

4 c. flour

1/3 c. sugar 

Place in bread machine and set to dough cycle. When done roll out on a pizza pan and slice with pizza slice into 8 pieces. 

*This recipe makes 16 crescents. They baked up beautifully. I have a recipe where I stuff crescent rolls with chicken and cheese and top with chicken soup and these rolls worked great in it. I have always used them for pigs in the blanket and for some of my recipes that call for crescent roll dough on the bottom of a pan. Just make sure your dough is rolled out thin if your using it in a pan or you will have to increase your baking time. 

Stuffed Zucchini 

These were soooo good! We used zucchini and tomatoes from our garden. 

Ingredients:

3 zucchini squash 

1 tablespoon butter 

5 bacon strips cooked (crispy & crumbled) 

1 tablespoon sour cream 

1 Roma tomatoes (seeded and chopped) 

1/2 onion (chopped fine) 

1/4 teaspoon salt 

1/4 teaspoon curry powder 

   to taste Parmesan cheese 

   to taste ground black pepper 

Directions:

 Slice zucchini in half lengthwise. Leave the ends on to keep the filling in. Scoop out the flesh with a melon baller or a spoon. Leave a ledge of zucchini around the edges. Place zucchini flesh in bowl and use spoon to chop up a little. 

Finely chop half a sweet onion. Cook bacon, cool, and crumble. Add onion to bacon grease or butter and saute. Add curry powder... cook until desired doneness of onions and remove from heat. To the zucchini flesh, add sour cream. Mix onion and bacon mixture with other ingredients. Taste and adjust seasoning.

Stir in the tomatoes. Refill the zucchini shells with the filling mixture.

Grate Parmesan cheese on top and sprinkle with fresh cracked black pepper if desired. Bake uncovered at 375 degrees F for 30 minutes. 

Strawberry Sour Cream Bars 

I used strawberries from our garden that I had frozen this spring. I just ran hot water over them to thaw enough to slice. 

Crust:

1/2 c butter, melted and cooled to room temperature

1/2 c light brown sugar

1 1/2 cup all purpose flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

Strawberry Filling:

1 c strawberry pie filling (2 cups fresh or frozen strawberries, 1/4 cup sugar, 3 tablespoons corn starch and 3 tablespoons water. Cook on stove until strawberries are mashed and filling is thick)

Sour Cream Mixture:

1/2 c sour cream

1/4 cup granulated sugar

1 Tbsp all purpose flour

1 egg

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 375 and prepare an 8×8 square pan by lining with parchment paper and spraying with cooking spray. Make the crust by whisking together in a medium bowl the flour, brown sugar, baking soda, baking powder and salt.  Add the melted butter.  The dough will be crumbly but make sure all of the butter is incorporated. Reserve 3/4 cup of the crust and press the remaining into the bottom of your 8×8 prepared baking pan. For the sour cream filling, mix together in a large bowl the sour cream, sugar, 1 Tbsp flour, egg, and vanilla.  Pour over the crust in your 8×8 pan. Spoon your pie filling over the sour cream and gently swirl with the sour cream filling with a spoon. Sprinkle your reserved 3/4 cup crust over the top and bake for 25-28 minutes or until golden brown.  Cool completely and serve into squares.  Store in the refrigerator up to 3 days.

* I have made these several times now and on two occasions I used canned pie filling instead of the homemade strawberry filling. We used apple pie filling once and lemon the other time. I thought the strawberry was best of course but the others were good too. You could use any pie filling you wish. 

 "Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God." 

1 Corinthians 10:31

Summer Fun: {Blackberry Jam}

We enjoyed making blackberry jam again this summer with some of the blackberries off of our bushes. 

Natalie & Annie helped me this year. 

Nattie mashing our blackberries

Cleansing bath for jars. 

Cooking the mixture. 

Final product! We actually made 4 jars but one gotten eaten up before I managed to get this picture. 

Blackberry Jam

5 cups crushed blackberries (do not puree, crush with a potato masher)

5 cups sugar

1 (1 3/4 ounce) package dry pectin  

Directions:

Carefully measure out the berries, put them into a very large pot (8qt). Measure sugar in a lg bowl.

Add the pectin to the berries a little at a time, stirring constantly. Heat on hi, stirring constantly until mixture comes to a FULL boil. Add sugar ALL at once, stirring. Bring mixture back to a full hard boil, stirring constantly. Boil for 1 minute. Remove from heat and ladle into clean, hot 8oz jars, leaving 1/4 inch space at the top. Wipe the rim of the jar and put canning lids and rings on fingertip tight. Place in canner with very hot water, make sure water is 1 inch above jars. Process in boiling water bath for 10 minutes. Remove and set them upright on a towel to set for 12 hours.

"And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which [is] upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which [is] the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat." Genesis 1:29