It's the weekend!

The weekend is my favorite time for baking and making those slow roasting meals, yummy! Thought I'd share a couple of my personal favorite recipes.


Toscana Soup
3 Cups Chicken stock or broth
1/2 Cup Heavy Cream
2 medium Potatoes-cubed
2 Cups Kale-chopped with woody stalks removed
1/2 lb. Sausage-spicy, break up pieces to resemble hamburger when cooking
1 tsp. Salt
1 Tbsp. Tobasco sauce

In large pot cook sausage and cubed potatoes until sausage is cooked and potatoes begin to soften. Add in kale and continue to cook 3-4 minutes. Add in Stock, cream, salt, and tobasco. Bring to a simmer and let cook 30 min. until potatoes cooked thoroughly and flavors combined. Add salt and pepper to taste if needed. You can add less tobasco if you are concerned about spiciness, I find that 1 Tbsp. added into the soup brings out the flavors.



Kahlua Pork
Pork Butt (really is the pork shoulder, butchers frequently label as Butt)
3-4 Tbsp. Liquid Smoke
2-3 Whole Bananas
Foil

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Take pork butt, fat side up and make long shallow cuts into it. Rub liquid smoke into pork. Lay whole bananas on top (you can wrap up in banana leaves instead), wrap roast in foil. Put on baking sheet to avoid a mess in the oven. Bake 45 minutes for every pound. When checking doneness, pork should shred off with a fork. Discard bananas. I like to serve it on a bun with BBQ sauce, or just dip into teriyaki sauce.



Grandma's Molasses cookies
These remind me of fall, and helping my grandmother around her home. She loved to bake and always enjoyed sharing her recipes with me.

1/2 Cup Shortening
1 Cup Granulated sugar
1 Egg
1 Cup Molasses
4 Cups All Purpose Flour
1/2 tsp. Salt
2 tsp. Ginger-ground
1 tsp. EACH; Nutmeg, Cloves, Cinnamon
2 tsp. Baking soda dissolved in 1 Cup Hot Water

Combine shortening, sugar, egg and molasses. Sift dry ingredients together and add into molasses mixture. Dissolve baking soda into hot water and add to mixture. Drop by Tbsp. on ungreased cookie sheets. Round tops and sides with back of spoon. Bake at 400 degrees for 8-12 min. or until springes back when touched. While warm ice tops.

Icing
2 Cups Powdered sugar
1 Tbsp. Butter-melted
3-4 Tbsp. Condensed milk
1 Tbsp. Vanilla extract



Sand Dollars
My mothers version of this recipe is called Mexican wedding cookies. I altered the recipe and found that I enjoy them even more. The recipe is small so I normally double or triple it.

1/2 Cup Butter -*unsalted, at room temp. (Do not sub with margarine)
1/4 Cup Powdered sugar
1 tsp. Vanilla extract
Pinch of Salt
3/4 Cup and 2 Tbsp. All Purpose Flour
1/2 Cup Walnuts-chop finely

Combine softened butter, sugar and vanilla. Add in salt and 3/4 cup flour. If too wet add in remaining 2 Tbsp. flour. Add in walnuts, the smaller the pieces the better. Chill 1 hour. Roll into small balls, place on ungreased pans and bake 350 degrees for 12-14 min or until top is firm and bottoms are golden. Take warm cookies and roll in more powdered sugar (I use a ziploc bag or you can put sugar in a bowl and roll cookies around).

*If you use salted butter, just omit the pinch of salt in the recipe*