Desiree at SteakandPotatoesGirl has chosen Guacamoldy with Creature Chips for next week’s project. Should be great for Halloween!

Desiree at SteakandPotatoesGirl has chosen Guacamoldy with Creature Chips for next week’s project. Should be great for Halloween!

This week’s project was chosen by yours truly:Chocolate Cake with Milk Chocolate Crunch and Caramel Sauce. This cake is from the Oct issue of Living and is a 20 bowl, 30 hour project. Ok, not really, but it did sound that way when I read it, but I found it didn’t take as much time as I thought it would. And for two weeks running, I completely screwed up my Martha Mondays project. This is supposed to taste like a 100 Grand candy bar, one of my childhood favorites. Mine didn’t quite work out as planned!

You start by baking a chocolate cake. I thought it had too much salt in it. Then you make Rice Krispie and chocolate candies. To anyone considering making this recipe – buy Nestle crunch bars instead! It would be much quicker and would come out much better.

Then you make the caramel which goes between the layers with the candies. This is where my disaster ensued. Mine got too hot. I took it off at the right temp, but it just got too hard. I couldn’t spread it. I was able to drizzle it but it hardened. We couldn’t even chew it and ended up picking it out of the cake. I’m sure this would have been good if it was edible. I was really upset about it.

Then you make a chocolate frosting. You do a crumb coat, refrigerate then do another layer.

The cake looked nice. We had a hard time cutting it since the caramel got so hard. The Rice Krispie candies got mushy, so the rice was no longer crunchy, which is why using candy bars would be a much better answer.

I think if I hadn’t completely ruined the caramel this would have been pretty good. I’m so disappointed in myself. Oh well. Onward and upward. Did anyone else make this?

This week’s project was chosen by yours truly:Chocolate Cake with Milk Chocolate Crunch and Caramel Sauce. This cake is from the Oct issue of Living and is a 20 bowl, 30 hour project. Ok, not really, but it did sound that way when I read it, but I found it didn’t take as much time … Read more →

Here’s the new schedule for the Martha Mondays picks. The date listed is the date your project will be done, so I will need to know what you’ve chosen at least one week prior. Any recipe or craft from the MS web site or current magazines is fair game (a book is fine too if you’re willing to type it out and send it to me so I can post it). Let me know if the date assigned does not work for you, if you’d like to be removed (if you missed your pick last round and did not contact me at all, you’ve been removed- if you want to rejoin, let me know), or would like to join up (all are welcome!). Thanks to all of you who are here every week (or most weeks). It’s really nice to cook with you and talk about the projects together. I’ve enjoyed getting to know all of you!

11/1 SteakandPotatoesGirl (new member, everyone say HI)

11/8 Mum in Bloom

11/15 At Least Twice a Week

11/22 Megan’s Cookin’

11/29 Sassy Suppers

12/6 Perfecting Pru

12/13 Tiny Skillet

12/20 Sweet Almond Tree

1/3 MarthaAndMe

We’ll take a break for 12/27 since everyone’s going to be busy in the week leading up to it.

Here’s the new schedule for the Martha Mondays picks. The date listed is the date your project will be done, so I will need to know what you’ve chosen at least one week prior. Any recipe or craft from the MS web site or current magazines is fair game (a book is fine too if … Read more →

I had an acorn squash to use. My mom used to cut them in half and roast with some butter and brown sugar in the cavity. I never liked this though because it all ran out when you tried to scoop some out. It was never an equal distribution  of butter and sugar to squash! So I decided to slice my squash up and roast it on a baking sheet. It cooked very quickly. I had it at 400 degrees and I think it was completely soft in 10-15 minutes. I then melted some butter and mixed it with a couple of tablespoons of brown sugar. I spooned this over the squash, salted and peppered it and popped it back in the oven for just a minute or two.

I loved this. Mr. MarthaAndMe said it tasted like candy. It was sweet, but not overpoweringly. I loved the ease of serving the squash as slices.

I had an acorn squash to use. My mom used to cut them in half and roast with some butter and brown sugar in the cavity. I never liked this though because it all ran out when you tried to scoop some out. It was never an equal distribution  of butter and sugar to squash! … Read more →

This blog has been nominated for a Blogger’s Choice award. I would be grateful for any votes! You can vote here.

This blog has been nominated for a Blogger’s Choice award. I would be grateful for any votes! You can vote here.

I’m in love. I found this shrimp burger recipe in Coastal Living. We do tend to eat a lot of shrimp since Dude Martha does not consider it “fish” and will eat it. Some quick breaded and pan fried shrimp is also a go-to for me when Dude Martha doesn’t like whatever I’m making for dinner.

You’ve got to try this. It was amazing. I served it on whole wheat rolls with lettuce. I mixed up mayo with Dijon mustard, dill, and lemon juice which was spread on the rolls. This was so good that when the kids each ate only half a burger, I scooped the remains off their plates and saved them and ate them the next day for lunch. This is like a fabulous shrimp po boy. Very easy, and very tasty. This is in my keeper file.

1 lb peeled, deveined medium shrimp

1 tbsp butter

1/2 cup finely chopped celery

1/4 cup finely chopped onion

1 1/2 cup panko

1/2 cup mayo

1 egg

1 tsp lemon zest

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp dry mustard

1/2 tsp pepper

1/2 cup vegetable oil

Pulse the shrimp in a food processor until chopped then place in a bowl.  Melt butter in a skillet and cook celery and onion until tender. Add to shrimp with 1 cup of the panko and mayo, egg, zest, salt, dry mustard, and pepper. Gently mix until combined. Form into 5-6 patties and place on a baking sheet lined with parchment. Freeze for one hour.  Then heat oil in a skillet and cook in the oil, about 3 minutes a side. Drain on paper towels.

I’m in love. I found this shrimp burger recipe in Coastal Living. We do tend to eat a lot of shrimp since Dude Martha does not consider it “fish” and will eat it. Some quick breaded and pan fried shrimp is also a go-to for me when Dude Martha doesn’t like whatever I’m making for … Read more →

After attempting to contact two different people (the one scheduled for this week and then the one scheduled for next week who both are MIA), I’ve given up and picked the Martha Mondays project for Monday myself. And to make myself feel better, I’ve chosen Chocolate Cake with Milk Chocolate Crunch and Caramel Sauce (p. 212 in October Living). If you need the recipe, let me know. It appears to be completely evil and diet-wrecking. It’s supposed to taste like 100 Grand candy bar, so I thought it would be appropriate as Halloween approaches.

If you’d like to join Martha Mondays (and are willing to commit to picking a project once every 3 months!), leave me a comment or send me an email. Anyone can play along. Make the recipe or project chosen and post results as a comment here or on your own blog.

After attempting to contact two different people (the one scheduled for this week and then the one scheduled for next week who both are MIA), I’ve given up and picked the Martha Mondays project for Monday myself. And to make myself feel better, I’ve chosen Chocolate Cake with Milk Chocolate Crunch and Caramel Sauce (p. … Read more →

Sounds good, doesn’t it? This recipe is from October Everyday Food. This recipe has everything a gal could want in a coffee cake – sour cream, apples, nuts, cinnamon, crumb topping. Thumbs down though. Not a winner. This would not cook all the way through no matter how hard I tried. It’s supposed to bake 60-70 minutes. I gave up after 80 because it was burning on the edges. I’m not even going to type the recipe here because I didn’t like it. It was moist, but moist to the point of mushiness. It had some spice flavor, but not enough. The crumb topping absorbed into the cake. Just not a good thing.

Sounds good, doesn’t it? This recipe is from October Everyday Food. This recipe has everything a gal could want in a coffee cake – sour cream, apples, nuts, cinnamon, crumb topping. Thumbs down though. Not a winner. This would not cook all the way through no matter how hard I tried. It’s supposed to bake … Read more →

As a thank you to all of my readers and in celebration of the two year anniversary of this blog, I’m giving away a Martha Stewart Crafts post-bound scrapbook. It’s a pretty green and has 10 dual pocket pages.  The size is 11 by 8.5 inches

If you’d like to enter the drawing, just post a comment to this post before Saturday, October 30, 2010. I’ll randomly and blindly select one winner. Sorry, offer limited to U.S. addresses only and entrants age 18 and up only. One entry per person. Winners notified by email, not responsible for email transmission problems. You are responsible for notifying me of your address if you are selected as the winner. Contest closes at midnight Eastern time on 10/29/10. Prize is nontransferable and may not be redeemed for cash. MarthaAndMe reserves the right to announce the name of the winner on the blog.

As a thank you to all of my readers and in celebration of the two year anniversary of this blog, I’m giving away a Martha Stewart Crafts post-bound scrapbook. It’s a pretty green and has 10 dual pocket pages.  The size is 11 by 8.5 inches If you’d like to enter the drawing, just post … Read more →

Thanks to Ana at Sweet Almond Tree for choosing Clam Chowder for this week’s project. I totally screwed mine up though. Sigh. It was a really, really rough week here with a family member mysteriously ill, a dog also sick, and Mr. MarthaAndMe MIA due to a major work crisis. In the middle of this I had two indexes due and two big client projects to write. In between doctor visits, radiology appts, and vet visits, I could barely think straight.

I made this one night thinking it would be a nice warm comfort food that people could just reheat as necessary through the week. I have a clam chowder recipe that is very similar to this one which I got from a Nantucket cookbook and I love it. That recipe tells me how much clam meat to use and I use frozen clams. Martha’s recipe says to use 8 lbs of clams in the shell. I wasn’t about to shuck clams for this so I used frozen clams again. I wasn’t thinking about the size of the recipe though and used an entire one pound bag of frozen clams. It was WAY too clammy.

I ended up adding lots more milk and some cream to this and then I thickened it with some flour since I had to add so much more liquid. It was still too clammy. And it was kind of an unappetizing gray color. Ugh. I ate some. Mr. MarthaAndMe (who just loves clams) ate some but that was about it. I’ve got lots left but it’s really just not very good. I can’t blame Martha for this at all – if I had used maybe half that amount of clams this would have been good.

Thanks to Ana at Sweet Almond Tree for choosing Clam Chowder for this week’s project. I totally screwed mine up though. Sigh. It was a really, really rough week here with a family member mysteriously ill, a dog also sick, and Mr. MarthaAndMe MIA due to a major work crisis. In the middle of this … Read more →