Steamed Vegetables with Rice and Fried Shrimp Dumplings!

This is a recipe that is perfect for family dinners because it makes a lot of food, or just or in my case just to make lots of leftovers to eat over the week. This dinner invcludes, steamed vegetables and rice with fried shrimp dumplings, this is one of my favorite meals to make. Sometimes I just add cooked chicken to the steamed vegetables and rice and don't make the dumplings so it takes less time to make, but the dumplings are so yummy and I love shrimp!

Ingredients:

frozen stir fry mixed vegetables

steamed rice

1 pkg cream cheese

12 pre-cooked shrimp

1 pkg wonton wrappers

fresh ginger

soy sauce

1. steam your rice in the rice cooker (I use jasmine rice)

2. to start your dumpling filling add cream cheese and grate the ginger into a bowl, (I like a lot of ginger in mine but out enough for your taste), mix both ingredients together. Then, chop the shrimp into pieces and add it to the cream cheese mixture.

3. Take your wonton wrappers and with the tip of your finger dip it into a bowl of water and smear the water around the edge of the wonton wrapper, put a spoon full of the cream cheese mixture onto the wonton, fold the wonton over as the wonton package shows you.

4. Begin steaming your vegetables in a pan with a little bit of olive oil (I added some extra shrimp to my vegetables as well).

5. Fry the dumplings in a pan with hot oil until they are crispy and golden brown.

6. Add the steamed vegetables to your steamed rice and add soy sauce to taste.  Then, set the dumplings aside or add them in as well and you are done! Yummy!



Frogalicious Cupcakes!!

So, for my little bro's 5th birthday I made him frog cupcakes, they were fun and simple to create and super cute!!! I made the cupcakes a few hrs ahead of time so they were cooled off to ice them and decided to be lazy and bought a can of pre-made frosting.

Supplies:

12 cupcakes
mini M&M's and regular sized M&M's (green and brown)
white frosting
green dye
red licorice

1. I sorted out all the green and brown M&M's first to make it easier.

2. Cut the licorice into thin slices and angling the ends into a mouth shape.

3. Set aside a little of the white frosting and add green dye to the rest of the frosting

4. Frost the cupcakes with the green frosting and then place the eyes on by using the white frosting to stick a green and brown M&M together to create an eye.

5. Next, place the licorice mouth on and the mini M&M's aroud the rest of the space on the cupcake to create little spots on the frogs.

Cinnamon Roll Crazy

So, recently I had a terrible craving for cinnamon rolls and even with the high cost of gas prices recently I simply had to go to the store because I was missing one crucial ingredient: powdered sugar. You simply cannot have cinnamon rolls without icing, no way jose`!!! I go icing crazy with my cinnamon rolls, don't be stingy with it, or butter for that matter! Anyway, so, I got home with my powdered sugar and decided to try a new recipe which turned out amazing but I thought I would be smart and make half a recipe...well, half a recipe made 3 pans of cinnamon rolls, my roommate and I were still eating them a week later lol! I tweaked the original recipe a bit to make it my own, the recipe said to add brewed coffee to the icing as well as milk, but I discovered that if you use one of those bottles of Starbucks Vanilla Cappuccino instead that it tastes much better to me and I already halved the recipe for you! This recipe takes a little bit of time and patience because the dough has to rise so many times but trust me it's so worth it!

Crazy Good Cinnamon Rolls:

   Ingredients:

• 1/2 quart Whole Milk
• 1/2 cup Vegetable Oil
• 1/2 cup Sugar
• 1 package Active Dry Yeast
• 4 cups (Plus 1/2 Cup Extra, Separated) All-purpose Flour
• 1/2 tsp Baking Powder
• 1/2 tsp Baking Soda
• 1/2 Tbs  Salt
• Plenty Of Melted Butter
• 1 cup Sugar
• Generous Sprinkling Of Cinnamon

        Vanilla Cappuccino Icing:

• 1/2 bag Powdered Sugar
• 1/2 bottle Starbucks Vanilla Capuccino

Preparation:

1.Mix the milk, vegetable oil and sugar in a pan. Scald the mixture (heat until just before the boiling point). Turn off heat and leave to cool 45 minutes to 1 hour. When the mixture is lukewarm to warm, but NOT hot, sprinkle in package of Active Dry Yeast. Let this sit for a minute.

2.Then add 4 cups of all-purpose flour. Stir mixture together. Cover and let rise for at least an hour.

After rising for at least an hour, add 1/2 more cup of flour, the baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir mixture together. (you could cover the dough and put it in the fridge until you need it – overnight or even a day or two if necessary. Just keep your eye on it and if it starts to overflow out of the pan, just punch it down).

3.When ready to prepare rolls: Sprinkle rolling surface generously with flour. Take half the dough and form a rough rectangle. Then roll the dough thin, maintaining a general rectangular shape. Drizzle 1/2 to 1 cup melted butter over the dough. Now sprinkle 1/2 cup of sugar over the butter followed by a generous sprinkling of cinnamon.

4. Now, starting at the opposite end, begin rolling the dough in a neat line toward you. Keep the roll relatively tight as you go. Next, pinch the seam of the roll to seal it.

Spread 1 tablespoon of melted butter in a seven inch round foil cake or pie pan.

5.Then begin cutting the rolls approximately ¾ to 1 inch thick and laying them in the buttered pans.

Repeat this process with the other half of the dough. Let the rolls rise for 20 to 30 minutes, then bake at 375 degrees until light golden brown, about 15 to 18 minutes.

6. For the icing, mix together all ingredients listed and stir well until smooth. It should be thick but pourable. Taste and adjust as needed. Generously drizzle over the warm rolls.

      Before and After Icing Photos:

    



What's for dinner?

Pizza Pizza and Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough!!!!

I loooove pizza and raw cookie dough is pretty amazing in my book, but this recipe doesn't have eggs in it so you don't have to worry about getting salmonella! Yay for that!

This is the bestest pizza recipe ever and of course you can put whatever toppings you want on it but I am a big fan of lots of cheese (especially if it's fresh mozzerella), olives and mushrooms!

The Bestest Pizza Recipe Ever:

Ingredients:

1/2 tbs active dry yeast
1tsp. sugar
1/2 cup warm water
1 1/2 cups flour
2 tbs olive oil
1 can tomato sauce
1 clove of garlic
mushrooms
olives
mozzerella cheese

1. To proof yeast, sprinkle yeast and sugar over warm water in a small bowl or glass measuring cup; stir until the yeast dissolves. Let the mixture stand until bubbly
   *make sure the water isn't too hot or it will kill the yeast and it won't bubble up

2. Add the yeast mixture to 1 1/2 cups of flour with 2 tbs of olive oil and stir until a smooth dough forms and then knead the dough on a floured surface.

3. Shape the dough into a ball and place into a blowl greased with olive oil, cover it with a towl and let it rise for at least 30 minutes.
   * the dough should almost double in size when its ready.

4. Assemble you topping while you are waiting for the dough to rise, chop your garlic and slice your mushrooms and olives etc. and pre-heat oven to 450 degrees.

5. Punch the dough down and knead it a few times to remove air bubbles in the dough; flatten the dough out on a floured surface and begin to roll it out into a circle.

6. Place the dough onto a baking sheet or I use my pizza stone sprinkle the dough with sauce, garlic, cheese and other toppings (I like to add italian seasoning to the sauce for extra flavor) and bake for about 10 minutes or until the crust looks crispy enough for you.

   *When using a pizza stone don't forget to place the stone in the over as you pre-heat the oven so it doesn't crack

7. Serve and enjoy!

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough!! (no eggs involved)

Ingredients:

½ cup Butter, Softened

¾ cups Brown Sugar

1 cup All-purpose Flour

2 Tablespoons Milk

1 cup Chocolate Chip

1. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

2. Add flour and mix just until combined.

3. Add milk until blended and fold in chocolate chips.

   *You can use other kinds of chips or cut up candies (Reese’s, M&M’s, mini choc chips, etc.) as well.

4. You can roll the dough into little balls and freeze them or just dig in with a spoon like I do and eat!



Introductions

Hello everyone! I would like to thank you for coming to my blog! I am new to the blogging world but I wanted to share my passion of cooking and baking with all of you. I have been dubbed Little Betty Crocker by my friends, so hence the name of my blog: A Modern Day Betty Crocker. I am a college student who likes to bake and cook in her free time, I love it when people come to me for creative cooking advice so I am hoping that this blog will help to inspire others. I come from a family where everyone cooks and can't remember a time when we were cooking dinner that everyone wasn't in the kitchen helping out with something even at a young age being given the task of setting the table or peeling vegetables, it made me feel so cool and grown up. Maybe I'm just a dork, lol but cooking is something that comes naturally to me and I am so grateful that I was brought up in that kind of family environment and that I learned so much about cooking from my family! Anyway, with that being said, Welcome to A Modern Day Betty Crocker and I hope that through my blog you will become captivated by the creativity of food and be able to share fun memories with your family and friends.