Cowboy Margarita

The easiest, quickest no blender needed margaritas eva'!

This recipe is world famous, at least you'd think it was in my family. I don't know who invented it, but I will always give my cousin Claude props and kudos. At every family event that happens at the ranch, about 12 handles of tequila is consumed in this bad ass drink.

The players:


The recipe:Take straight from our little flip recipe holder that Aunt Kate gave as a Christmas gift many years back. This recipe and recipe book has seen a lot of love and wear.

Diet Lemon-Lime soda can be used for a "diet" version. And I always add an extra can of soda. It's a super strong recipe without that extra soda. Still good, but it'll knock you off your feet.

So go, mix, partake of the Cowboy Margarita over this festive Labor Day weekend!

Congo Bars

Congo Bars were a regular occurrence growing up. Mom would make them because they're easier than cookies, but taste more or less just like them. Delicious! Easy! Yummy! Simple!

Straight from the recipe card...

These are the ingredients you'll need. Not the granulated sugar though, ignore that tub. I got a little, ah, excited and just pulled everything out of the cabinet.
And when they're done... Can you smell that? ...No? Well, you're missing out. So you better just get in kitchen and whip up a batch.
Congo Bars
Ingredients:
2/3 cup melted butter
1 lb. brown sugar
3 eggs
2 1/2 cups flour
2 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla
dash to 1/2 teaspoon salt
1 package chocolate chips
1 cup chopped nuts (optional)

Melt butter, add brown sugar. Mix well. Add eggs, one at a time. Add the following: flour, baking powder, vanilla, salt, chocolate chips, and nuts (optional). Pour into jelly roll pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 30-35 minutes.

Peach Sorbet

After having a surplus of diced peaches, like 2 gallons, left over from a catering job, I just couldn't bear to waste or dump them. And I knew that they're time would soon be expiring. So what do you make with diced peaches? Cobbler, sure. Pie, sounds good. Shortcake, tired of it. Sorbet, now that sounds good... Then I had to find a recipe. I didn't want just pureed peaches and simple syrup, I wanted more. Something unique. Something different. And let me tell you. I found it!

May I present to you...

Peach Sorbet
Serves 8. 3 1/4 hours, 15 minutes prep.

4 cups peeled* and diced fresh peaches, and their juices
3/4 cup fresh lemon juice*
1 cup sugar
5 tablespoons amaretto liqueur or orange juice concentrate

1. In a blender, whip peaches and their juices until smooth.
2. Heat remaining ingredients in a saucepan over low heat until sugar is dissolved. Remove from heat and stir in peach puree.
3. Pour into an 8-inch square pan and set in freezer. Using a rubber spatula, stir every 15 minutes until creamy, about 2 hours.* Cover and allow to freeze.
4. To serve, scoop into small dishes and garnish with fresh fruit.

Nutrition Facts: calories 135, total fat 0.2g, dietary fiber 1.4g.

*Yea, the dices peaches I already had weren't peeled, so I didn't bother. I like to look of them not peeled, little specks of red throughout. And weren't you taught, a lot of the nutrients are in the skin! And I think I ended up putting more like 5 cups in the blender...
*Ran out of lemon juice, so I used lime too. And it wasn't fresh, the juices came out of the little plastic lemon and lime squeezey things.
*I didn't waste my time with a pan, spatula, and 2 hours. Into the Cuisinart ice cream maker it went. 30 minutes later I transferred it to a Tupperware container and into the freezer it went. Much easier!

Recipezaar

Black Bean Corn Salsa

Who likes salsa? Who likes chips? Who likes salsa with chips?

Yea, me too!

I made the salsa this past Monday for Bible Study. I had a hankering for it, so I made it to share.

I learned this recipe while I was in college. One of my roommates would make it whenever she was asked to bring something to a party. After the first bite before she walked out the door, I made her swear that she would bring home the leftovers. There generally wasn't any left over though. Bummer.

But I managed to memorize the recipe. HA! Sometimes that memory thing doesn't fail me!

The Ingredients:
There is one (optional) ingredient missing, a lemon. It's ok though, the world will not come to an end if you don't have lemon.

The Instructions:
Open and drain a can of black beans and a can of corn.
Dice a couple of tomatoes, I used 2 but use as much as you'd like.
Dice about a 1/2 to 2/3 of a yellow onion.
Mince up some garlic, I used 3 cloves maybe that was a little much though.
Dump it all in a bowl and mix.
Season with salt and pepper to taste.
Option: Add juice of a lemon, as much as you feel needed.

It takes no time at all to whip this up. Chopping and dicing takes the longest. Darn chopping and dicing!

Make sure you sample. How do you know it's good if you don't sample?

I would like to point out that no oil or fat was added to the making of this recipe. Therefore, it's gotta be healthy. Right...?

Enjoy!

And when that was all done, I had dinner. Dinner of champions I must say. I did spruce this box of macaroni up though. I added some diced onion, sliced up 98% fat free turkey dogs, and real shredded cheese. It was delicious!

Then Bible Study happened and I had more chips and salsa. I'm counting it as a serving of vegetables!

Strawberry Angel Food Cake

I have found a way to turn a slightly low calorie and low fat treat like angel food cake, into not so low cal and low fat. Oh, but the outcome is delicious!

The Ingredients:

The Instructions:
Bake the angel food cake according to packaging directions.
Slice strawberries.
Whip whipping cream and powdered sugar to taste until fluffy and whipped cream like. Note: do not walk away from whipper, you could end up with butter.

I didn't get a picture of the final results, but I'm sure you can figure out what I did.
1. Take a slice of cake.
2. Top with strawberries.
3. Top with whipped cream.

Super easy. Super good.

Enjoy!