Thursday, January 5, 2012

Happy "Brrrr-thday" Nico!

My nephew Nicolas had an Arctic birthday party for his fourth birthday.  It was so cute.  I have to commend my sister for being so creative as there is not a whole lot of canned ideas out there for an Arctic Fishing themed birthday.  She did a wonderful job with the decorations and the games.


The guests received little fishing tackle boxes filled with goodies



Cari baked a delicious and beautiful chocolate cake



Iceberg treats

I made these sugar cookies and without even planning it, they matched the party colors perfectly!


Happy 4th Birthday, Nico!  God bless you always.
We love you!


Monday, January 2, 2012

It's Always About the Food

I hope everyone had a wonderful New Year's Eve and New Year's Day.  We had a wonderful time with friends and family on both days.  What a way to end the year and start a new one!  And in true Padilla-Casillas family style, no get-together is complete without delicious food.

On New Year's Eve, Jeanette and my mom made Enmoladas which are like Enchiladas except instead of dipping the corn tortilla in enchilada sauce you dip it in mole sauce.  They were so delicious and I was so excited that I totally forgot to take a picture of them.  Sorry!  But trust me, if you like mole, you will love Enmoladas.

I made Ceasar Salad Deviled Eggs, recipe courtesy of Smitten Kitchen.  Deviled eggs are good but they're not something I usually think of making.  They are deceitfully laborious.  But I was intrigued by this recipe and judging by how fast they flew off the platter, I'm guessing they were pretty good.

I also baked these Churro Cupcakes.


I love churros, especially when they are filled with Dulce De Leche, so when I came across this recipe on Love and Olive Oil, I knew I had to make them.  In their recipe, they filled the cupcakes with chocolate pudding and topped them with a chocolate whipped cream frosting.  Since I like my churros filled with Dulce De Leche, I decided to fill the cupcakes with that and since it was New Year's Eve, I opted for a champagne buttercream frosting which I found on i am baker.  The result:  Pure Joy!!!

It's so easy to make your own Dulce De Leche, it's dangerous.  At a zillion calories a spoonful, it's a good thing I don't remember to make it often.  But anyway, here's how to make it:

Take a can of condensed milk and place it in a stock pot with about 6 cups of water and bring to a boil.



Once the water comes to a rapid boil, lower heat to simmer and cover pot.  You will leave on simmer for 2 to 3 hours depending on how dark and thick you want the Dulce De Leche.   Please be very careful not to exceed the cooking time of 3 hours because the can will eventually explode and you will have a huge mess.  This happened to my grandmother once.  For the cupcakes I wanted it to be a little runny so that I can fill them easily, so I cooked it for about 2 hours.  My thought was to pipe it into the cupcakes but then I decided to cut the tops off of the cupcakes and spoon it in just like it said to do in the recipe.

Here you will see the difference in color and texture of the Dulce De Leche.  The one on the top was cooked for 2 hours and the one on the bottom was cooked for 3 hours. 



You can make the Dulce De Leche ahead of time as it will keep in the refrigerator for about two weeks.

Once I had baked the cupcakes, I cut out a cone-shaped well and filled them with the Dulce De Leche.


To the tops, I cut off a little from the pointy end so that they fit back on nicely.  Don't worry about the seams because you will cover them with the frosting.



These were so delicious.  I can't wait to make them again!

For New Year's Day, we had a spontaneous small gathering at our house.  The day was so beautiful and warm.  David and Mr. Casillas decided to make shrimp two ways; David: Camarones Agua Chile, which is kind of like a shrimp ceviche, Mr. Casillas: Spicy Shrimp Tacos (don't know if the recipe has an actual name).  I don't have the recipes for these but if you are interested, leave a comment and I will get them.

David's Camarones Agua Chile
Mr. Casillas' Spicy Shrimp Tacos
It is both a blessing and a curse to have a foodie family.  Now that there are 5 pounds more of me to love, you can all guess what one of my New Year's resolutions is.

Have a blessed year!

XOXO


Saturday, December 31, 2011

Christmas 2011


We hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas this year and that the Nativity of our Lord, Jesus Christ, takes place in your hearts every day.  As we get ready to welcome the new year and we look with hopeful hearts to what it could bring, we offer you peace, love and friendship.  May God abundantly bless you and yours! Cheers!

Here are some pictures of our decorations around the house.

Kitchen Tree
I never got around to adding the tree skirt.  Usually I use a pink afghan as the skirt but this year, it was being used elsewhere.  Oh well!



This was our very first ornament from our very first Christmas together in 1995.


Our angel tree topper.  One of my favorite ornaments for our main tree.
Mateo's tree
Mateo has had a tree in his bedroom since he was a baby.  This year, I decided to put his tree in our family room because his bedroom is under transition right now. Every year we buy a new ornament for his tree.

This year's addition: Jack Skellington
The Nightmare Before Christmas is one of my favorite movies.





Instead of hanging our stockings on our mantel, I like to hang them on the door knob of the bedroom doors.  Yup, you guessed it, these are mine and Mr. Casillas' stockings.




Blessings!
XOXO


Thursday, December 29, 2011

Cookie Lessons

For months, my sister-in-law, Jeanette, has been talking to me about her colleague, Shannon, who is the hostess over at the misanthropicHostess blog.  Her blog is a great source for baking tips and ideas.  Shannon is very knowledgeable and her writing is witty and fun.  I have been enjoying her blog since Jeanette first mentioned it.  Jeanette, the forever matchmaker, had been trying to get us to meet, but for some reason or another, that meeting didn't come to be until just a couple of weeks ago.  Jeanette arranged a little cookie decorating clinic with Shannon and I was happy to open up my kitchen so that I may extract a few tips and secrets from Shannon in person. I have to stay, Jeanette was right; we really hit it off.  We now have a future clinic penciled in for macarons.  Yay!! I'm so excited since you all know how much I enjoy making and eating macarons.

Here are a few tips I learned from Shannon:
  1. When making your sugar cookie dough, you can immediately roll it out between two layers of parchment paper, layering them on a cookie sheet.  You can then refrigerate your rolled out cookie dough until you are ready to cut the shapes (at least 30 minutes, but preferably overnight).  If you do this instead of refrigerating the dough in a ball, it is ready to go when you are and it makes cutting the shapes faster and easier.  When you're ready to cut the shapes, take out a layer of rolled out dough one at a time and cut, then place the cut shapes on another cookie sheet that you may also layer between parchment paper and refrigerate those at least 15 minutes before baking.  The cookies will hold their shapes better when baking.  Later, when I tried this on my own, I arranged the shapes as I would on my cookie sheet for baking and when I was ready to bake, I just transferred each layer with the parchment paper onto a cookie sheet and baked.  It was so much faster and easier!
  2. A thick cookie is better than a thin one.  I used to roll out my cookie dough too thin and sometimes my cookies would break, especially the ones with delicate shapes.  By rolling out the dough a little thicker (about 1/4"), you get a sturdier cookie and there is more cookie to eat and it actually tastes better!
  3. For the royal icing, you do not need egg whites or meringue powder.  All you need is simply confectioners sugar and water.  I used to use egg whites and I always worried about the raw eggs.  Now I will always use water!  Shannon also uses lemon juice instead of water for a flavoring variation.  I'm sure you can also use other flavorings like a few drops of colorless vanilla, almond and peppermint extracts.  Ooh, I think I'm going to try that next time.
Here are a few pictures from our cookie clinic:

Everyone brought their cookies baked and ready to decorate

There's Shannon (far left)


Making the royal icing








Even Nico got to learn

The ladies and their creations

Mine

Viviana's.  She is turning out to be quite the baker and decorator.

Cari's

Soon, I will post pictures of my Christmas cookies.

XOXO