May 2021 -

May 11

How to Make Beef & Mushroom Skewers with Soy & Scallion Butter

Seriously, these beef and mushroom skewers are PHENOMENAL. It’s 100% the marinade and the butter you place on top. They just take the flavor profile to the next level. My husband and I loved them and devoured almost the entire thing, this recipe is one that I will definitely add to our rotation. These skewers are super easy to make and would be perfect for a weeknight where you want something tasty and easy. I personally paired these with some grilled corn on the cob and it was the perfect meal.

There is a caveat I want to make about the soy and scallion butter. For one, I cannot find scallions anywhere! Pandemic issue or is everyone buying scallions?! I ended up substituting for chives since I couldn’t find any scallions. Additionally, I felt like the butter didn’t mix well and I couldn’t get it smooth enough. What I did instead was so heat up the mixture and use it more as a marinade/spread to use after the kabobs had been cooked. I was still able to get a great amount of flavor and it was far easier to spread. The recipe originally calls for you to dip the kabobs into the butter mixture but that just wasn’t going to work when I made them.

Overall Review: 5/5

I highly recommend you try this recipe, it was easy to make and the taste was amazing. Beef and mushroom skewers can be paired with any number of sides and would be a crowd pleaser if you have guests over. Be aware that when meat is cut small like this it gets cold fast, you will want to serve and eat these pretty quickly so you get the full effect. If you decide to cook these, please let me know what you think in the comments below!

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Beef and Mushroom Skewers with Soy and Scallion Butter

Recipe from Giada De Laurentiis

Print Recipe

Servings 4 Kabobs

Ingredients

Skewers

1/3 cup Olive Oil
4 Garlic Cloves
1 tsp Salt
1 tsp Black Pepper
1 (1 1/4 pd) Sirloin Steak cut into 3/4 inch pieces About 24
24 Button or cremini mushrooms (or what you can find) 12 oz of mushrooms

Butter

8 tbsp Unsalted butter at room temperature
3 Small Scallions (if you can find them, I had to sub with chives)
1 Garlic Clove
1 1/2 tbsp Soy Sauce

Instructions

Skewers

In a small bowl, mix olive oil, garlic, salt and pepper. On your skewers alternate the meat and mushrooms until you are out. Arrange on a baking sheet and evenly marinate the olive oil mix on all pieces on the skewers. Let sit for at least 15 minutes.
Heat a grill to medium heat and grill until about medium in temperature (or whatever you prefer). Transfer to platter and let rest for a few minutes. Right before serving add the butter mixture on top of the skewers (you can dip but spreading on top worked amazing for me). Serve immediately.

Butter

In a small bowl and use a fork to combine butter, scallions, garlic and soy sauce until smooth

May 04

Love0

How to Make Peanut Butter Cookies with Blackberry Jam

By kaldridge Food No Comments

These peanut butter cookies with blackberry jam was one of the first recipes I wanted to try when I got Giada’s cookbook. It was such an interesting concept adding the blackberry jam and I was curious to see what it would taste like. Let me preface this entire review by saying that I am 30 almost 31 weeks pregnant and my taste buds have been hit and miss at times. I will definitely make these again once the baby is here and my taste buds are a bit more normalized. But for now, here is my initial assessment of these cookies.

These are really easy cookies to make but they are BIG cookies. These are not small chocolate chip cookies, they are 1/4 cup cookies that flatten as you bake them. To give you a visual, one cookie will fit a small plate. My biggest issue with these was keeping the blackberry jam in the center. As they baked the jelly spread quite a bit. Additionally, the area where the jelly was got real thin and hard since from the liquid of the jelly. I double checked the recipe and it said that the jelly went in before baking, not sure if the cookie would turn out the same if you added the jelly at the end or even after baking. But this was one of the first issues I found. The other issue that I found was that the level of cocoa powder made that taste come through more than the peanut butter. So be prepared for quite a bit of cocoa powder taste when you make these cookies.

Overall Review: 3/5

When it comes to the taste of these peanut butter cookies with blackberry jam, they are honestly not my favorite. It’s not that they are necessary bad, they just aren’t great. I’m wondering if it would be better to do chocolate chips instead of cocoa powder? But overall they are good if you are looking for this specific taste. Later this year, I will try them again to update you and see if they taste better once my taste buds are back to normal. If you decide to try them let me know in the comments below.

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Peanut Butter Chocolate Cookies with Blackberry Jam

Recipe from Giada De Laurentiis

Print Recipe

Servings 10

Ingredients

1 cup All purpose flour
1/3 cup Unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 tsp Baking soda
1/8 tsp Fine Sea Salt
8 tbsp Unsalted butter at room temperature Cut into 1/2 inch pieces
3/4 cup Creamy peanut butter
1 cup Granulated sugar
1/2 cup Packed light brown sugar
1 Large Egg Beaten at room temperature
1 tsp Pure Vanilla Extract
1/4 cup Blackberry Jam

Instructions

Preheat oven to 375 degrees and line baking sheets with parchment
In medium bowl, sift or whisk flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt
In another bowl or mixer, beat butter, peanut butter, 3/4 cup of granulated sugar and all light brown sugar until smooth.
Add egg and vanilla and mix until blended. Gradually add flour and mix until just incorporated. Don't continue to mix once you can't see flour.
In a small bowl place the remaining 1/4 cup of granulated sugar. Form dough into 1/4 cup balls and roll in the sugar. Should make about 10 balls. Only place 5 balls on a baking sheet and make sure they have space between them.
Use a 1/4 tsp to make an indentation in center of each ball (1/2 to 3/4 inch deep). Spoon a tsp of jam into each indentation
Bake cookies for 11-14 minutes until cookies are crackled and dough has spread. Cool for 5 minutes before transferring to rack and then cool completely for 20 minutes before eating.