American Flag Cake Recipe

This American flag cake recipe is so easy and the patriotic cake makes and appearance at Memorial day and Fourth of July every year.  An easy Jello poke cake recipe that is so refreshing too on a hot summer's day.

How To Make A Jello American Flag Cake:

You will need:

• One box of white or vanilla cake mix and what is required to bake it.
• 3 oz. box of strawberry Jello and two cups of boiling water.
• Fresh strawberries and blueberries, washed and dried.
• One container of Cool Whip or homemade whipped cream.

Instructions for making the Jello poke cake:

1. First bake a white boxed cake mix up in a rectangular pan. When it is cooled, use the end of a wooden spoon and poke holes evenly around the whole cake about 1 inch apart.

2.  Dissolve three ounces of strawberry jello into 2 cups of boiling water. Don't let the Jello cool to where you can't pour it well. When it is ready, pour over the entire cake into all the little holes you made.

3. Refrigerate uncovered about three hours so it firms up. Then, cover the top of the cake with homemade whipped cream or Cool whip.

4. Take your washed strawberries and slice them uniformly so they will lay flat. Create the stars and stripes with your blueberries and strawberries. Keep cake cooled in refrigerator until ready to serve. Enjoy!

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Easy French Bread

If you bake one type of easy bread to bake it should be this recipe for easy French bread. Baking bread can be hard but this recipe is quick and there is nothing like baking fresh bread to make your family happy.

I am working towards baking more of our own bread. Store bought bread not only is expensive but is full of preservatives and loads of sodium. I will share bread recipes as I continue this series. But this is a great starter bread recipe for the beginner bread baker.

You can bake two larger loaves or split it into three smaller loaves. Total rising time for this French bread recipe is only an hour and a half. I served this with easy potato cheese soup found on our recipe page.

Easy French Bread

Recipe by Elaine Lewis

An easy French bread recipe that any beginning baker could handle but everyone will enjoy.

Cook time: 20-30 minutes. Three smaller loaves will bake faster than two larger.
Yield: 2-3 loaves
Ingredients

• I packet or 2 1/4 teaspoons active yeast
• 1/4 cup warm water
• 1/4 teaspoon sugar
• 1 cup hot water
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• little more than 1/2 tablespoon salt
• 1/4 cup oil
• 3 cups all purpose flour

Cooking Directions

1. Place warm water in small bowl and add yeast and the 1/4 teaspoon of sugar and mix well and let sit for five minutes. Next, I use a stand mixer so either in the mixer bowl or a large mixing bowl add the hot water, oil, sugar and salt. Add half the flour and the yeast mixture and stir well. Add the rest of the flour and combine. Leave the sticky dough mixture in the bowl and cover with a slightly damp towel or plastic cling wrap that is loose to allow a little air in the bowl. Let rise for one hour but stir a couple of times with a wooden spoon.
2. You can make two larger loaves or three smaller, so divide the dough into two or three equal sections. With a rolling pin on a floured board, roll out to about an inch or so thick in an oval/rectangle shape and then roll up the dough into a long log shape. Place flap side down on a greased cookie sheet or parchment paper. Slice the tops just a bit down the loaves and brush with raw egg. Let rise another 30 minutes. No need to cover at this point.
3. Preheat oven to 400 degrees fahrenheit. Bake 25-30 minutes until a dark golden color.

Easy Sourdough Starter

I am such a fan of making and using your own sourdough starter. It is so active and bubbly. I make waffles and pizza dough with it, but my goal is bread. Our own sourdough bread. I vow to try many recipes and let you know my favorite. 

Here is the easiest way to get a starter going. I honestly do not weigh. Just use the measurements and you are on your way. 

Create a Baking Basket - Kitchen Quick Tip

Another in our kitchen organization series. When I go to bake or stir up something from scratch, I don't want to have to go here or there to gather my ingredients so I created a baking basket. All my baking and scratch cooking needs in one place.

In my basket I keep all that I would need for basic baking organization in one place.

Here is what I keep in my baking basket:
Measuring cups
Measuring spoons
Cookie scoop
Yeast packets
Baking soda
Baking powder
Cream of tartar
Vanilla and extracts
Food coloring
Frosting tips

Keeping baking items organized makes it easy to grab my baking supplies with one hand and mix up something from scratch just like that.

Ultimate Banana Bread

The most requested decadent ultimate banana bread recipe in the house. The girls request this version of moist banana bread the most. Our version of what we call the ultimate banana bread.

What makes it ULTIMATE is all the extras you throw in there. Chewy, dense and moist with lots of crunchy additions.

Ultimate Chocolate Chip Banana Bread

Recipe by Elaine Lewis @ sunnysimplelife.com

Ingredients

• 3 ripe bananas
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 1/2 cups flour
• 3/4 tsp teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 cup oil
• 2 egg yolks
• 1/2 cup shredded coconut
• 3/4 cup chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup chopped macadamia nuts

Cooking Directions

1. Mash bananas first and mix in yolks in large bowl or with mixer. Add remaining ingredients into same bowl. Mix well. Fold in nuts, coconut and chips. Bake in a greased loaf pan or two small loaf pans at 350 degrees for one hour checking with a toothpick to come out clean. If you use the smaller loaf pans start checking for doneness at 45 minutes.

I like to bake in two smaller loaf pans so I can freeze one but mostly because I like to have my banana bread done all the way through without the edges getting burned or too done.

Ugly Christmas Sweater Party

Some friends hosted an ugly Christmas sweater party this past weekend. Now I don't buy that many new clothes so I thought why waste money on an ugly sweater so I found this sort of gaudy Snoopy sweater and added some dollar tree embellishments. Figured, hey, I like Snoopy so I can maybe wear this again. It was fun and lots of folks had sweaters with Christmas lights.

Here we are heading out the door. Frankly I have to admit, I used to love all those sweaters, now considered ugly, with the knit embellishments and Christmas decor. Yep, I had me a few of those.

 The hostess had a daughter who is a pastry chef so her cookies were of course perfection. Ugly sweater cut out cookies. They were so cute I hated to eat them but I did, I ate several of them.

Organized Baking

I have a daughter who is blessed with an organized mind. I strive for it but let's just say I have had to teach myself how to function in an organized manner. Some folks are lucky enough to be born with the gift. I love to watch her bake.

Whatever is on the menu, she always makes sure the kitchen is cleaned of all dirty dishes and then gets out everything she needs for the recipe.

As she uses each item she will put them away. No big mess when she's done.

She even manages to keep things tidy with a little taste tester in her way.

Down to how she stores the cookies when they are done, she moves in such an organized fashion. I am jealous but I am also always watching her and other very organized people I know. Watching how they do things can teach us less organized folk how to accomplish tasks in a better way.

Frugal Challenge - Fresh Baked Bread

Comparing the cost of home made bread to store bought bread. Breaking down the ingredients I have figured it costs about half the cost of store bought bread to make bread yourself at home. That is with using standard sized ingredients from the grocery store. It would be even cheaper to make bread buying bulk sized ingredients for making bread.

The other day I was plum out of bread and had no car to get to the store. Mine was in the shop. So what's a mom to do? I thought, hey let me bake some bread. With my Kitchen Aid it is so easy because it does the kneading for you. So in just a few minutes I had bread dough rising on the stove and by lunch time I had two loaves of bread.

Now, I don't know about your family, but ours eats a lot of bread. Sometimes four loaves a week and it is getting so expensive along with everything else. I have been wanting to start baking some of our own bread to save money and because it is probably better for us without all the preservatives.

I think it is well worth it. The kids loved it and it sliced so well. This was an oat recipe as I was trying to use up oatmeal that I had stockpiled. I will definitely use this recipe again but what I am hankering to do is make my own sourdough starter. I think I will start it this week and let you know how the bread comes out. Can you smell it? Fresh homemade sourdough bread.