ALL STRAWBERRY...ALL THE TIME

There was a super sale on strawberries, so I purchased 4 lbs of strawberries and was cooking to my hearts content.  The product of this is: happy family, happy friends, and one ginormous blog post.  Please forgive and enjoy!  Cheers, Mindy

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Put 'em Up! Fruit
6 of 171 recipes...
127 to go...

Strawberry Balsamic Glaze 

&

Pan-Seared Pork Chops with Strawberry Shellac

All in a days work.  In one day I made this delicious strawberry glaze and then used it to make some yummy pork chops.  FINALLY, a meat recipe.  Paired well with fresh strawberries and a summer time salad, this meal was awesome and super lite!

This glaze recipe started like a jam recipe, then finished with a few more steps.  After straining the strawberry chucks/waste from the syrup, I added balsamic vinegar and red wine to the concoction.  Allowing it to cooking a little longer than the book described because it didn't thick in ten minutes, this glaze was ready to be the only ingredient (besides salt and pepper) to flavor the pork chops.   

The 'use it up' recipe had me broiling the pork chops for a few minutes on each side.   A little leery of the quick cooking time, I watched these chops like a hawk.  In doing so, I still had a crisp, slightly blackened top side; but over all I was really impressed with this recipe!!
If you ever visit for a BBQ, it just might come from the oven using this recipe.

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Strawberry Rhubarb Jam & Flourless Chocolate Cake

This past weekend my edible contribution to Easter brunch were sweets.  The following two sections of recipes were my addition to a very lovey brunch at my mothers house.  For a little additional flare, I decorated the chocolate cake for Easter (pictured left); followed by my normal blog photo describe by the cookbook (pictured right).

  

The chocolate cake was SUPER easy-peasy to make.  My only hang up is: if I wasn't watching the cake in the oven, it would have been over done by ten minutes.  It cooked much quicker that the instructions indicated; oh well.  For this recipe, I also had to opportunity to utilized my homemade double boiler system again; with a bowl in a small sauce pan (to melt the bittersweet chocolate).

Because I've been making a lot of jam recently, I cut the Straw/Rhub Jam recipe by half.  That was the silliest move I've done in a long time.  This jam recipe is da-bomb!  Not at all thick due to my troubles working with calcium water (a jam additive?), this jam is the perfect match for the chocolate cake.  With that and the whipped cream on top, it cut the overwhelming chocolate cake just enough to enjoy.  I will make this jam again, probably not the chocolate cake.

SIDE NOTE: The chocolate basket pictured on the upper left was created by melting chocolate and piping it atop of a balloon to harden.  BUT be careful!!  If you add too much at once, the balloon could pop...and then you're late for Easter brunch; trust me, I learned the hard way.  Take a minute to imagine molten chocolate ALL over your kitchen.  

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Mixed Berry Jam & Linzer Tart Cookies

Also created for Easter, I made cookies that resembled the Sandies cookies similar to what you'd find in a grocery store, but these had a fantasy twist (HAD, because they're all gone). And in the Easter/Spring spirit, I chose to make flower shaped cookies rather than the round ones the book called for.  Much prettier, right?!

 

Starting with the jam, the recipe called for assorted berries and without having to buy anything additional, I happened to have blackberries to accompany the last of the strawberry supply.  Calling for calcium water, similar to most of the other jam recipes in this book; the jam didn't thicken very much and I and two pint of very tasty syrup.  As you can see from the picture, the cookie filling is pretty thin, but I worked.  The cookies were devoured like no one knew the jam didn't do it's thickening th'ang.