Making fuzzy butter...

Nicholas loves to look over my shoulder when I'm scrolling social media, he saw my watching a video on how to make peach butter. We have peaches... lots of peaches. Last year we had zero peaches so this year we are embracing every fuzzy piece of fruit we can wrangle. We decided this one was worth a try. We also decided the peach butter should have some cinnamon, so we took a few recipes and tweaked them. Making this in the crockpot is the way to go. Set it and stir once in a while and be done with it. We used the stick blender because that makes life so much easier. We can wait to try this on biscuits. We LOVE apple butter so hoping this is a new favorite too!

Peach Butter
10 lbs peaches – pitted
1 lemon juiced
2 cups brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon

Crush peaches with hands & add everything to a stock pot. Simmer over medium heat for 45 mins, until it’s reduced to a thick sauce.
Immersion blend halfway through
Water bath for 10 mins

Two recipes stirred together makes one amazing recipe.

Earlier this year when we went strawberry picking, we thought how amazing freezer peach jam would be too - not only that... but what if we made a combo strawberry and peach jam!! Back 16 years ago Andy and I made 9 gallons of strawberry peach jam for our wedding favors, but freezer jam is SO much easier and tastes better, I think. I tried to find a recipe and failed... miserably. So I opted to make two full recipes - one of strawberry and one of peach - then we stirred them together and viola - Strawberry Peach Freezer Jam! Or Jelly as I grew up calling it. Oh my... oh my!! So good! We did use the food processor to chop up both fruits, that seems to work better for some reason for the Certo pectin. Thankfully, I had jars from my mom that worked great for the freezer. The peach tree keeps on producing so we may just make some peach jam too to add to the freezer, guess we'll see what the rest of the season brings. So, here's two full recipes - stir them together and there you go...

Strawberry Peach Freezer Jam

CERTO® Strawberry Freezer Jam
2 cups prepared fruit (buy about 1 qt. fully ripe strawberries)
4 cups sugar, measured into separate bowl
1 pouch SURE-JELL CERTO Premium Liquid Fruit Pectin
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice

Rinse clean plastic containers and lids with boiling water. Dry thoroughly.
Stem and crush strawberries thoroughly, one layer at a time. Measure exactly 2 cups prepared fruit into large bowl. Stir in sugar. Let stand 10 min., stirring occasionally.
Mix SURE-JELL CERTO Premium Liquid Fruit Pectin and lemon juice in small bowl. Add to strawberry mixture; stir 3 min. or until sugar is dissolved and no longer grainy. (A few sugar crystals may remain.)
Fill all containers immediately to within 1/2 inch of tops. Wipe off top edges of containers; immediately cover with lids. Let stand at room temperature 24 hours. Jam is now ready to use. Refrigerate up to 3 weeks or freeze up to 1 year. Thaw in refrigerator.

CERTO Peach Freezer Jam
2-3/4 cups chopped peaches (about 2.25 lb. fully ripe peaches)
6-1/2 cups sugar, measured into separate bowl
2 pouch SURE-JELL CERTO Premium Liquid Fruit Pectin
1/3 cup tbsp lemon juice

Rinse clean plastic containers and lids with boiling water. Dry thoroughly.
Peel and pit peaches. Finely chop or grind peaches. Measure exactly 2-3/4 cups prepared fruit into large bowl. Stir in sugar. Let stand 10 min., stirring occasionally.
Mix pectin and lemon juice in small bowl. Add to prepared fruit mixture in large bowl; stir 3 min. or until most of the sugar is dissolved and no longer grainy. (A few sugar crystals may remain.)
Fill all containers immediately to within 1/2 inch of tops. Wipe off top edges of containers; immediately cover with lids. Let stand at room temperature 24 hours. Jam is now ready to use. Store in refrigerator up to 3 weeks or freeze extra containers up to 1 year. If frozen, thaw in refrigerator.

Egg shells are not delicious....

Andy's Friday night meetings at our house have looked a little different since Spring. You see you don't have a road or sidewalks... so it's a tad bit difficult hosting anyone over at our house. Instead, he heads over to church with treats in tow and hosts over there. Somewhere with streets, sidewalks, AND parking! What a concept. These bars have been on my "hope to make" for a while and finally able to make them for these guys. Thankfully, they were a hit, and they left a few for my meeting with my leaders’ group. I also love in the recipe how the says the 2 large eggs are 100 g out of the shell... let's not be adding shells to the batter folks... that's crunch no one is interested in.

Rocky Road Chocolate Cookie Bars
10 tablespoons (141 g) salted butter, cut into pieces
2 cups (340 g) semisweet chocolate chips, divided
¾ cup (159 g) packed light brown sugar
½ cup (106 g) granulated sugar
2 large (100 g out of shell) eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 ¾ cups (249 g) all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons (12 g) cocoa powder
¾ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon baking powder
¾ cup (84 g) chopped pecans or walnuts
2 ½ cups (142 g) mini marshmallows (half of a 10-ounce bag)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line a 9X13-inch pan with parchment paper. Lightly grease with cooking spray. Set aside.
In a large microwave-safe bowl, combine the butter and 1 1/4 cups (213 g/7.5 oz) of the chocolate chips. Microwave for 45-second intervals, stirring in between, until melted and smooth (don't over heat).
Add the brown sugar, white sugar, eggs and vanilla and whisk to combine well.
Add the flour, cocoa powder, salt, baking soda, and baking powder. Stir until just combined and no dry streaks remain.
Add the pecans and remaining 3/4 cup chocolate chips (128 g/4.5 oz). Stir until evenly combined.
Press the mixture into the prepared pan and immediately (while the dough is soft) sprinkle the marshmallows over the top. Push the marshmallows lightly into the dough with your fingers (kind of like stippling the top of focaccia bread).
Bake for 22 to 24 minutes until the marshmallows are lightly golden, the edges are set and the middle is puffed (don't over bake – if you aren't sure if the bars are done, err on the side of under baking slightly).
Let the bars cool in the pan. Cut into squares and serve. These are delicious at room temperature, slightly warm, or chilled.

I'm not a boy scout, but I do like to be prepared

Being prepared and working ahead is one of my soundtracks... I will put the work in early, so I have fewer things to do later and then procrastination is not a thing. Well, this time my being prepared benefited church instead of the extended family. We were supposed to go to a family reunion in Wisconsin, and I planned to bring some sweets. These M&M Cookie bars turned out amazing, thick, chewy, so good. The family reunion? We couldn't go - Andy had an emergency with work so stayed in Illinois instead of heading north. This whole pan of bars ended up at church on Sunday for an after service treat instead. I know for sure people appreciated them there as well.

M&M Cookie Bars

2 sticks unsalted butter at room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup brown sugar firmly packed
3 large eggs
1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
3 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups M&M's plus more for topping
1 cup mini chocolate chips plus more for topping

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Line a 9×13 baking dish with foil, leave some overhang to make removal easier.
Spray foil generously with nonstick cooking spray.
In the bowl of a stand mixer, beat butter, granulated sugar, and brown sugar together until fluffy.
Add in eggs and vanilla extract and continue to beat.
Lower speed of mixer and add flour, baking soda and salt and mix until combined.
Add M&M’s and mini chocolate chips and give a final stir, reserving some M&M’s and mini chocolate chips for topping cookie bars.
Transfer cookie dough to prepared baking dish.
Press additional M&M’S and chocolate chips into top of cookie dough.
Bake for 30-35 minutes or until bars are a light golden brown and just set in the center.
Let cool completely and cut.

Winning with Garlic Bread!

We've tried quite a few garlic bread recipes in our house and have failed to come up with a true winner. We love making French Bread, but after a day or two it's not as good as the first and second day... Sure we make French toast - but sometimes Garlic Bread would be great... we found great! For some reason we ended up with three pasta dishes in a row so we decided garlic bread would be perfect to add to dish #2. We had all the herbs fresh in the garden, so we went that route and the original recipe banked on the salt in the butter for the salt aspect - I added more. We tossed it under the broiler, and it turned out amazing. The bread was still somewhat soft but had crispy areas, but didn't break your teeth, the topping wasn't super thick... perfect saltiness... SO good. This is what we'll keep on using. The garlic bread search has ended; we have a winner!

Garlic Bread
1 (14 oz) loaf French bread
1/2 cup salted butter, softened
1 Tbsp minced fresh garlic
1 Tbsp finely chopped fresh parsley, or 1 tsp dried (optional)
1 Tbsp finely chopped fresh basil, or 1/2 tsp dried (optional)
1 Tbsp finely chopped fresh oregano, or 1/2 tsp dried (optional)
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cut French bread loaf in half horizontally.
In a small mixing bowl stir together butter, garlic, parsley, basil, oregano and pepper. Brush mixture evenly over top of both bread halves.
Place bread on baking sheet and bake in center of preheated oven for 8 minutes.
Move oven rack closer to broiler. Let bread broil about 45 seconds to 3 minutes until golden brown. Keep an eye on it, it can brown quickly.
Cut into slices and serve warm.