Mennonite Monday - Breakfast Bundt Cake

Mennonite Monday started because I wanted to make recipes from the Bethesda Mennonite Church Cookbooks (both the yellow and the white cookbook for those of you who own them). I also wanted to take pictures of each recipe that I made, so I would know for future reference what the recipe should look like. I am by no means a great cook, but I think it will be fun to try new and different recipes each week. Not all of these recipes are for ethnic Mennonite food, but the women from Henderson know how to cook, so I can safely say that these recipes will be good. Check back each Monday for a new recipe and feel free to leave a comment if you have a favorite recipe from these cookbooks, or if you have some tips on what I should make and how I should make it.

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This week I needed a coffee cake to take to a morning meeting, so I used this opportunity to make the Breakfast Bundt Cake (pg 59 W).  It was a great recipe that went together quickly and was very moist.  

Breakfast Bundt Cake 

1 pkg yellow cake mix

1 pkg vanilla instant pudding

3/4 cup corn oil

3/4 cup water

4 med. or 3 large eggs

1 tsp vanilla

 1/2 cup chopped nuts

2 Tbl sugar

2 Tbl cinnamon

Grease bundt pan. Mix nuts, sugar and cinnamon.  Combine cake mix, pudding mix, oil and water.  Mix well.  Add eggs one at a time, mixing well after each egg.  Beat 6-8 minutes on high speed.  Layer batter and cinnamon mixture, starting and ending with batter.  Bake at 350* for 45 minutes.  Cool in pan for 8 minutes remove and glaze with the following: 

 1 cup powdered sugar

1/2 tsp oleo

1 Tbl milk 

1/2 tsp vanilla

 I started out by mixing this in a bowl and then I realized that I was going to need to beat the mixture for 6-8 minutes, so I decided to switch to the mixer. 

 The batter was really smooth, which I would not have been able to do by hand. 

 The recipe never stated when to add the vanilla, so I added it after the eggs.  

 Fully mixed batter. 

 I used the Pam for baking, which was a great product for this type of baking. 

 The cinnamon, sugar, nut mixture went much further than I thought it would. 

 After baking. 

 Following the flip.  I had no problems with the cake sticking to the pan.  

 I mixed the frosting the night before, so all I needed to do in the morning was pour it on. 

 The final product. 

The layers of cinnamon, sugar and nuts made a nice swirl in the cake.  

Mennonite Tuesday - Orange Julius

Mennonite Monday started because I wanted to make recipes from the Bethesda Mennonite Church Cookbooks (both the yellow and the white cookbook for those of you who own them). I also wanted to take pictures of each recipe that I made, so I would know for future reference what the recipe should look like. I am by no means a great cook, but I think it will be fun to try new and different recipes each week. Not all of these recipes are for ethnic Mennonite food, but the women from Henderson know how to cook, so I can safely say that these recipes will be good. Check back each Monday for a new recipe and feel free to leave a comment if you have a favorite recipe from these cookbooks, or if you have some tips on what I should make and how I should make it.

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After a crazy week last week, see next post, I opted to host Mennonite Monday on Tuesday.  To be honest, I do think I cooked anything last week.  I'm pretty sure I ate, but I was so busy I couldn't really tell up from down and I was not organized enough to plan ahead. I decided to whip up a Orange Julius (pg 2W) for something refreshing and it definitely hit the spot.  My mom actually put this recipe in the cookbook and when I asked her about it she said "Oh I put that in there, I made those when we were first married," which is why I never remember having them growing up.  Now I'm kind of wishing we would have had them more because they are really good.  

Orange Julius
1 6 oz can orange juice
1 cup water
1 cup milk
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla
12 ice cubes
Blend all ingredients in a blender.

It was as simple as that! No explanation needed.  

Mennonite Monday - Delicate Fluffy Pancakes

Mennonite Monday started because I wanted to make recipes from the Bethesda Mennonite Church Cookbooks (both the yellow and the white cookbook for those of you who own them). I also wanted to take pictures of each recipe that I made, so I would know for future reference what the recipe should look like. I am by no means a great cook, but I think it will be fun to try new and different recipes each week. Not all of these recipes are for ethnic Mennonite food, but the women from Henderson know how to cook, so I can safely say that these recipes will be good. Check back each Monday for a new recipe and feel free to leave a comment if you have a favorite recipe from these cookbooks, or if you have some tips on what I should make and how I should make it.

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On Saturday Mike was hungry for pancakes.  Since I had just volunteered our bag of pancake mix to a fund raiser breakfast next week, I decided to use this opportunity to make some pancakes from scratch. So I decided to make Delicate Fluffy Pancakes (pg 35 W).  

Delicate Fluffy Pancakes

3 eggs, separated

1 2/3 cups buttermilk

3 Tbl Soft margarine

1 1/2 cups flour

1 Tbl sugar

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp soda

1/2 tsp salt

Combine all ingredients except egg whites.  Beat the egg yolks and fold stiffly beaten egg whites into mixture.  (my note: I think the last sentence should read: Beat the egg whites then fold stiffly beaten egg whites into mixture.)

 All of the dry ingredients. 

 Adding the egg yolks and buttermilk.  Since I did not have buttermilk, I used a buttermilk substitute.  The combination is 1 cup of milk plus 1 Tbl vinegar.  

 Everything mixed together except the egg whites. 

 To make egg whites stiff, you have to use a mixer because they won't get stiff otherwise.  

 Mixing int he egg whites in. 

 Finished batter. 

Mennonite Monday - Granola

Mennonite Monday started because I wanted to make recipes from the Bethesda Mennonite Church Cookbooks (both the yellow and the white cookbook for those of you who own them). I also wanted to take pictures of each recipe that I made, so I would know for future reference what the recipe should look like. I am by no means a great cook, but I think it will be fun to try new and different recipes each week. Not all of these recipes are for ethnic Mennonite food, but the women from Henderson know how to cook, so I can safely say that these recipes will be good. Check back each Monday for a new recipe and feel free to leave a comment if you have a favorite recipe from these cookbooks, or if you have some tips on what I should make and how I should make it.

~

This week I wanted to make something a little different, so I chose Granola (pg 137 Y) by Leona Sawatzky.  I liked this recipe because it had less ingredients than some of the other granola recipes and it took less time to cook.  
All of the recipes for granola called for wheat germ,which I was not able to find.  I really didn't look too hard for it, so I have no idea if it is easy to find.  I basically convinced Mike to stop at Walmart on the way home from the state fair, so I could pick up some wheat germ.  I'm not a fan of Walmart, especially the groceries, because it is hard to find what you need and their Great Value brand is taking over the name brand products.  This trip basically solidified my frustrations after I asked an employee where I could find Wheat Germ and he looked at me like I was talking in a different language.  Anyway, I did not include wheat germ in this recipe, and I hope those of you who try it have better luck finding wheat germ.  

Granola

6 cups oatmeal

1/4 cup packed brown sugar

3/4 cup wheat germ 

1/3 cup cup sesame seeds (optional) 

1/4 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 cup oil

1/3 cup honey

1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla

1 cup chopped nuts (optional) 

1 1/2 cup raisins (optional) 

Heat oats in an ungreased pan 10 minutes at 350 degrees.  Combine all dry ingredients with oatmeal.  Mix together liquid things.  Then add to dry mixture.  Bake in oblong pan at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes.  Stir often so that it will cook evenly.  Cool.  Stir until crumbly.  Store in a tight container in the refrigerator.

 6 cups of oatmeal

 Mixing the liquid ingredients. 

 I added my dry ingredients to the pan that the oatmeal was in, so I didn't make a bunch of pans dirty. 

 Adding raisins and nuts. 

 Adding the liquid ingredients. 

 Everything mixed together before it went to the oven. 

.  The crispy finished product.

Mennonite Monday - Mulberry Muffins

Mennonite Monday started because I wanted to make recipes from the Bethesda Mennonite Church Cookbooks (both the yellow and the white cookbook for those of you who own them). I also wanted to take pictures of each recipe that I made, so I would know for future reference what the recipe should look like. I am by no means a great cook, but I think it will be fun to try new and different recipes each week. Not all of these recipes are for ethnic Mennonite food, but the women from Henderson know how to cook, so I can safely say that these recipes will be good. Check back each Monday for a new recipe and feel free to leave a comment if you have a favorite recipe from these cookbooks, or if you have some tips on what I should make and how I should make it.

~

 After picking mulberries with Jodi in June, I have been thinking about the different ways I can use mulberries in recipes.  I came across a recipe for mulberry muffins (pg 33W) and I knew I needed to try it.  I was very impressed with these muffins.  They mixed together easily and tasted really good.  

Mulberry Muffins

2 cups flour

4 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

6 Tbl sugar

3 Tbl melted butter

1 egg

1 cup milk

1 cup mulberries

Measure flour and reserve 3 Tbl to dust berries.  To remaining flour add baking powder, salt and sugar.  Add beaten egg and melted butter to milk and combine with dry ingredients. Fold in berries.  Drop by spoonful into greased muffin tins.  Bake at 400 degrees for 25 minutes.  Yields: 12-15 muffins. 

 Dry ingredients.

 Egg, baking powder, salt and sugar. 

Adding the dry ingredients.

 Mulberries with flour. 

 Mixing in mulberries. 

 Batter.

 I filled the muffin tins 3/4 full. 

 They were golden brown after 25 minutes. 

Eating warm muffins with butter is the best.

NEXT WEEK: Cherry Rolls (wish me luck they are going to test my cooking ability)