Best Ever Homemade Lemon Cheesecake

For some reason the humble cheesecake is something that every aspiring home chef seems to have troubles with at one point or another. Common problems include large cracks, burned top, lumpy filling, collapsed centers and the amazing shrinking cheesecake (cake shrinks around the outside).

All of these problems tend to go away when the cheesecake is prepared and cooked properly. Here then is how to prepare and cook what is sure to be a family favorite, Homemade Lemon Cheesecake.

Before we get cooking, a little science if you please. Most of the problems mentioned above all stem from an improper cooking process. That usually is because people treat the recipe as if it was for a cake. But the truth is, cheesecake is a lot more similar to a custard pie than it is to a regular cake recipe. So, that means we need to work and cook the ingredients differently.

First is the pan. Some people recommend using a spring form pan but I don’t like them. The reason will become apparent when we get into the cooking process. For now locate a 9 inch round cake pan with nice high sides (at least 2 inches). We first need to treat the pan so we can get the cooked cheesecake out later. For that, melt some butter and using a brush, coat the entire inside of the pan. Next, using parchment paper, cut out a circle for the bottom of the pan and a long rectangle for the side. Once the parchment has been added to the pan, we can focus on the crust. Continue reading “Best Ever Homemade Lemon Cheesecake”

Baking Bread – Cuban Pan De Ajo (Cuban Garlic Bread)

Last week I went down to Miami for the first time to sample and report on the vibrant Miami food community. What I found was a food community full of amazing exile stories, dangerous ocean crossing adventures, and wonderful snapshots of great Miami food fare, especially Cuban food. Along with my staffer Emily, we were especially smitten with the smell, taste,texture and serving methods of Cuban bread.

Cuban sandwiches are world renowned and a staple at any Cuban restaurant. Emily thinks it is the bread that makes the sandwich. That debate can rage on forever. The actual Cuban white bread is not at all complex, but actually quite simple. It has a different baking method and is made with different ingredients than French or Italian bread. The bread is baked in a cold oven over boiling water before it reaches its desired baking temperature. Cuban bread is then baked with a dab of lard or vegetable shortening. Real Cuban bread is baked in long, baguette-style loaves. It has no preservatives so it will not keep long. After a few days, the bread becomes extremely hard. This bread is made to be enjoyed right away. The best way to use it besides in a sandwich, is to have it served at breakfast. In Cuban households, the bread is toasted with butter and served with a hot mug of cafe con leche for breakfast. Continue reading “Baking Bread – Cuban Pan De Ajo (Cuban Garlic Bread)”

Webkinz Recipes

Webkinz recipes are a great way to enhance the fun of the online Webkinz experience. Pet owners must provide great food and interesting recipes to keep their new pets happy. Just like real pets, these stuffed animals need a good home, a friendly and helpful owner and above all this, delicious food. Owners are always on the lookout for new delightful food creations; these virtual pets, and their real world counterparts, are voracious and finicky eaters. Making your pet happy takes more and more creative ingredients and there are many great online resources.

Sorting out all the available recipes can at first be challenging. With dozens of these online toys available, all having their own favorite food, it can sometimes be hard to find the perfect one. These virtual pets are just like real pets; they like variety in their food, and they don’t all necessarily like to eat the same things. Finding the perfect recipe for your picky toy can be as simple as browsing the internet and looking around for that special ingredient that your animal will be crazy about. Continue reading “Webkinz Recipes”

How to Make Flying Saucer Bread

This recipe can not be found in any cookbook. In fact, I coined the name for this bread myself. It is bread that I enjoyed when eating bologna sandwiches during my early school days growing up in New Jersey.

I first came across this strange bread during school lunch break. Across from my school, in the middle of Newark, New Jersey was my favorite deli. There was always a line of students waiting to get their freshly baked bread with their favorite meat and cheese.

Then during my high school years, I found this bread again. My palate was beginning to develop and I had gone from bologna sandwiches to Italian style hot dogs. This is a fantastic hot dog sandwich stuffed into a cut half of flying saucer bread covered with mustard, peppers, onions and fried potatoes.

Continue reading “How to Make Flying Saucer Bread”

Easy Elderberry and Strawberry Jam

I had what I call, this great idea today while eating my peanut butter and elderberry jam sandwich. I’m not much for food preparation. I like to cook and I like to entertain but I’ll tell you what, processing fruits for canning is a royal pain. It took forever to strain those chokecherries. Granted the juice was delicious but there must be a faster way so I come up with a cheat while enjoying my sandwich. I simply scattered my thawed elderberries in the elderberry jam to add a little more to the sandwich and thought why not mix elderberries with existing jam? Choose your favorite flavor. Mine will most likely be raspberry and strawberry. Yep, I’ll do it twice.

So let’s call this the lazy mans recipe to elderberry jam, shall we? After all we have all the ingredients available in the jam from our storage already or we can buy it from the store. Now I’m sure there are all kinds of reasons this should not be done. Something about the preservatives? Perhaps the ratio will be off when adding the new berries to the existing jam? I’m not an expert but I figure this can be an easy way to at least get the goodness of those elderberries into your peanut butter sandwich so you can enjoy the protection from the flu this season. I’m sure you guys reading this will appreciate my efforts. Continue reading “Easy Elderberry and Strawberry Jam”

Cooking Grilled Cheese on an Electric Griddle

Few things can cure an upset stomach or the rainy day blues quite like the combination of grilled cheese and a big bowl of tomato soup. Though it is a relatively simple dish to prepare, it remains a standard American comfort food throughout the years. While many know how to make a grilled cheese sandwich, few know how to make it well. Instead, they accept their mediocre piles of bread, filled with cold cheese. America, it does not have to be this way.

“Hold on just a second,” you might be thinking, “are you trying to tell me that there’s a better way to make grilled cheese?” You bet there is, and it’s surprisingly easier than you could ever imagine.

The secret to the perfect grilled cheese is by cooking it on an electric griddle. Electric griddles are available at almost any department store – such as Sears, Target, K-Mart or Walmart – for a very reasonable price on average (usually well below the $70 range). Electric griddles are easy to cook with and even easier to assemble: simply plug it into the wall and you are ready to start cooking!

Most electric griddles feature a top of the line non-stick cooking surface, but to create the truly magical grilled cheese sandwich, the chef should use butter or margarine (depending on personal preference or dietary restrictions) to cook the bread. The butter or margarine should be applied to one side of both pieces of bread. Continue reading “Cooking Grilled Cheese on an Electric Griddle”

Healthy Meals For Kids At Restaurants

It’s usually challenging to feed your kids healthy foods especially when you like dining out. Although, it’s challenging, it’s not impossible. All you need to do is to be choosy of the foods that you give your child when you are in a restaurant. Some of the best foods that you should give your child include:

Grilled chicken and Pasta

Grilled chicken and Pasta are one for the best dishes that you should give your child when you visit an Italian restaurant. The dish contains 350 calories, 6 grams of fat, and 5 grams of fiber. Although, the food doesn’t have high amounts of calories, the sodium levels are too high (840 milligrams); therefore, you should not give it to your child on a regular basis.

Sandwich

This is another great dish you can give your child. Although, the deli sandwich looks very enticing, you should avoid it as it tends to contain over 1,000 milligrams of sodium. Instead of it, you should take PB&J sandwich which contains 410 calories, 18 grams of unsaturated fat, and 550 milligrams of sodium. Continue reading “Healthy Meals For Kids At Restaurants”

Webkinz Recipes and More!

Are your children having trouble figuring out recipes on Webkinz World? These unique toys that allow children and young teens to create an online pet can be much more complicated than you’d expect. Despite tutorials on the main Webkinz site, and despite numerous websites devoted to these adorable pets, it can be difficult to figure out exactly what to do! This is especially true for the younger children like mine and for recipes in particular. After I helped them get past creating ‘gunk’ (the stuff that is produced from failed recipes), I thought it would be great to share some helpful pointers.

How do you find the recipes- On Webkinz world there are recipes so you can let your pet try something new. You have to have 3 specific different foods and put them either in the oven, in the sandwich maker, the blender, or on the barbeque. But how do you find these recipes? There are 2 different ways. One of the ways is to watch TV by turning on your Webkinz television and selecting the cooking channel. Chef Gazpacho tells you many great and interesting recipes and they are always different. This is a great way to learn exactly what works! If you do not own a TV you need not rush to buy one for your pet. A simple alternative is to visit the W-Shop and just buy a recipe book, although in my experience many of these recipes are not as interesting.

The different cooking appliances– For cooking there are four different appliances. There is a stove, a sandwich maker, a BBQ, and a blender. While it’s great to have all these different appliances to make your pet some great food, you must be careful! If you put the wrong ingredients into an appliance you will end up with ‘gunk’. We will cover ‘gunk’ a bit more in a moment, but for now just know that your pet will not eat it. For example; if you were making a sandwich on the oven then you will get gunk, but if you make a sandwich in the sandwich maker, you will succeed and have a delicious sandwich for your Webkinz pet to enjoy. The oven is used to make things such as spaghetti and pies. The sandwich maker is obviously to make sandwiches, the blender is to make things such as smoothies and milkshakes, and the BBQ is for making things like hamburgers. To find more recipes for the BBQ or blender, remember you can buy a cook book, it will contain many delicious recipes for your Webkinz. Continue reading “Webkinz Recipes and More!”

Quick Facts About Panini Grills

Weary of eating precisely the same boring sandwiches all the time, each single week? Why not mash them up and opt for something unique every time you really feel like eating a sandwich. People often declare that varying stuff up makes living much more interesting. Therefore, why not have yourself a Panini maker and cook up your most fascinating sandwiches. You’ll be able to serve up the greatest Panini sandwiches by just working with one kitchen equipment.

A Panini is the Italian term for a sandwich. The word Panini serves as the plural form of a specific term. Even though it is not really appropriate to pertain to a single sandwich as simply a Panini, you still can’t deny the simple fact that these are delicious sandwiches. Putting meats, cheese, greens could create a much more unique not to mention yummy Paninis all the time.

In addition, making use of a Sandwich grill can enable you to make stuff which are much healthier for the reason that you are able to grill a panini while not actually adding too much fat. Everything you actually require to accomplish is squirt on a little oil or maybe a smallish quantity of butter and you’re good to go. The butter or else oil will assist in making sure that the panini will not adhere to the surface of the grill or pan. Continue reading “Quick Facts About Panini Grills”

How To Prepare A Speech Using The Hamburger Sandwich Approach

“Help! I have to give a speech. What do I do?” my business colleague asked me.

Business people are asked frequently to speak in front of a group. New authors

must speak to organizations and businesses so that they can promote their books.

Speaking in front of an audience can be scary if it is new to you. The following four

simple steps will help you plan and prepare your next speech.

The four elements used to prepare your speech are:

The creative idea
The attention getting opening
The purposeful body
The powerful close/conclusion/climax

Continue reading “How To Prepare A Speech Using The Hamburger Sandwich Approach”