L's Special Quiche Lorraine (+ Zucchini)

hi all. due to the fact that i come from family that is highly attentive to the culinary wonders of the world, i will have occasional contributing editors who also share the love of baking. here is the first post by my fabulous sister, l. *golf claps all around!*

l. is a self-proclaimed 'chef extraordinaire'. she is addicted to better homes & garden, organic vegetables, and fresh cooking. she is trying to hone her cooking skills because her first baby girl will be born in late April! she vows that her daughter will never know what a fast food restaurant is. l. has lived for extensive periods of time in the US and Asia. she currently resides in vienna, austria with her husband. l.'s real job is a cosmetics entrepreneur.

her first contribution: special quiche lorraine (+zuccini). this is quite a delicacy! according to wikipedia, a quiche is a baked dish that is made primarily of eggs and milk or cream in a pastry crust. culinary beauties like this can NOT go unnoticed, or the human appreciation of food will simply falter. while i havent tasted this salty pie yet, rest assured, l's cooking is of utmost quality and freshness. it just looks so scrumptious!

L's Special Quiche Lorraine (+ Zucchini)

the whole baby!

Ingredients
Pastry for Single-Crust Pie (you can buy it pre-made or make it from a prepackaged pack)
5 slices bacon
1 medium onion, thinly sliced
4 beaten eggs
2 cups milk
1/4 teaspoon salt
5 slices of chopped ham
1/2 cup long sliced zucchini
3/4 cup shredded Swiss cheese
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
Splash of dried herbs

Directions

1. Prepare Pastry for Single-Crust Pie. Line the unpricked pastry shell with a double thickness of heavy duty foil. Bake in a 450 degrees F oven for 8 minutes. Remove foil. Bake for 4 to 5 minutes more or until pastry is set and dry. Remove from oven. Reduce oven temperature to 325 degrees F. (Pie shell should still be hot when filling is added; do not partially bake pastry shell ahead of time.)

2. Meanwhile, in a large skillet cook bacon until crisp. Drain, reserving 2 tablespoons drippings. Crumble bacon finely; set aside. Cook sliced onion, zucchini, chopped ham in reserved drippings over medium heat until tender - a little brown is ok.

3. In a medium mixing bowl stir together the eggs, milk, and salt. Stir in the herbs, crumbled bacon, sliced onion, zucchini, and chopped ham. Toss together shredded cheese and flour. Add to egg mixture; mix well.

4. Pour egg mixture into the hot, baked pastry shell. Bake in the 325 degrees F oven for 50 to 60 minutes or until a knife inserted near the center comes out clean. If necessary, cover edge of crust with foil to prevent overbrowning. Let stand 10 minutes.



recipe courtesy of lcc.

the BEST chocolate chip cookies

hi guys! thanks for all the encouragement! im so motivated to bake my little heart away this weekend! yay for ovens! i didnt get a chance to bake yesterday but i wanted to post my pictures of the BEST chocolate chip cookies EVER! no joke! its so good that i will post the recipes after the pictures! let me tell you again, the secret to soft cookies, which i adore, is pudding mix!!!! thats the way to go guy, no joke. my roomie from college diana introduced me to the great idea!

check these babies out!
look at all that melted chocolate gooey-ness! yum!


BEST chocolate chip cookies!

Prep Time: 15 Minutes
Cook Time: 12 Minutes
Ready In: 1 Hour 40 Minutes
Yields: 72 servings

INGREDIENTS:
4 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 cups butter, softened
1 1/2 cups packed brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
2 (3.4 ounce) packages instant vanilla pudding mix
4 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
4 cups semisweet chocolate chips
2 cups chopped walnuts (optional)

DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Sift together the flour and baking soda, set aside.
2. In a large bowl, cream together the butter, brown sugar, and white sugar. Beat in the instant pudding mix until blended. Stir in the eggs and vanilla. Blend in the flour mixture. Finally, stir in the chocolate chips and nuts. Drop cookies by rounded spoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheets.
3. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes in the preheated oven. Edges should be golden brown.



recipe courtesy of allrecipes.com

Chocolate Galore!

last night i was inspired to bake by my new deck of chocolate cards from my boss! i tried hard to give the cookies/brownies a gourmet feel with a makeshift double boiler to melt the chocolate and butter. it really worked because these babies were all infused with chocolate love! what i baked last night: low fat brownies, chocolate chocolate cookies, and chocolate oatmeal chocolate cookies.


the brownies were ok. they were my first attempt at low fat baking so i substituted 2/3 of the butter for applesauce. interesting idea, needs a little bit more tweaking. on a scale of 1-10, id give it a 6.5. i wanted to give it a higher score, but anythign higher would be an injustice to the real chocolate lovers of the world! the texture was fabulous, but the brownies had a little bit of an apple taste to it because of the apple sauce. my mom and aunt loved it though! they likened it to a chinese bread because of the reduced butter usage/apple sauce substitute. im goign to play around with this recipe some more so that it tastes as good as it looks!

chococlate chocolate cookies were not sweet enough. i loved the texture though, inside was almost cakey with a nice chewy outside. had there been more sugar, these cookies would have been a big hit. the neat part of these cookies is that i took chocolate chips and chopped them so that they werent big bites of chocolate, but rather well merged chocolate flakes with the chocolate cookie as the backdrop. texture was fabulous! the secret of soft cookies is pudding mix! it also gives it a nice shelled look! yum!

the chocolate oatmeal babies were awesome. after tasting the chocolate chooclate cookies i added more sugar into the mix and re-balled my cookies. these were fab! the chocolate was so well mixed into the cookie - it was such a delight to my tastebud!

so, when i organized the fruits of my mini baking extravaganza, this is what it looks like! not so shabby coming from a newbie baker/wannabe food blogger with her digital camera!

on a side note, the next time i will just do low fat or gourmet. its hard to do both at the same time when you are an amateur! also, better quality pictures next time! i promise! my battery was dying as i clicked away! in the lineup, thumbprint cookies and strawberry cupcakes!

happy afternooning!

Greetings!

ive spent a lot of time in my kitchen, especially with my handy oven, in efforts to create fun, yummy baked goods to send to friends. if you arent a recipient of such goods, please give me your address!

so after careful consideration, i've finally decided to start my own baking blog! it took me a while to come up with a name, but decided to go with .... *drumroll please*

iCANbake... get it?

because i literally CAN bake, and CAN is the first three letters of my name!

im not a digital camera powerhouse, but im working on it. and if the baking meets my standards, i will put the recipe online and boast about it incessantly. LOL. oh! im also a big fan of low fat cooking (yogurt/applesauce instead of oil/butter, egg whites, etc).

you will have to bear with me as i conquer the world one baked good at a time.